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ۤt ftltjBtmj Inlntb: 
 
 OR, 
 
 IRELAND'S MISERIES; 
 
 THE GRAND CAUSE, AND CURE. 
 
 BY T1IE 
 
 REV. EDWARD MARCUS DILL, A.M., M.D., 
 
 MISSIONARY AGENT TO THE IRISH PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH. 
 
 NEW YORK: 
 
 ROBERT CARTER & BROTHERS, 
 
 No. 285 BROADWAY. 
 
 1853. 
 

 
 , *^i b£- 
 
 T. B. SMITH, STEREOTYPES, R. CRAIGHEAD, PRINTER, 
 
 216 William Street, New York. 53 Vesey Street- 
 
 \ 
 
 N? 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 PART I.— IRELAND'S MISERIES. 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 GENERAL WRETCHEDNESS. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Country's present appearance — Commerce — Manufac- 
 ture — Agriculture — Depopulation — Evictions, &c, . 9 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 THE FAMINE. 
 
 Frightful mortality — Scenes of horror — Affecting inci- 
 dent, <fec., 14 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 EMIGRATION. 
 
 Extent — Progress — Miseries — Evils: moral, political, and 
 social, tfec, 16 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 INCREASING PROSTRATION. 
 
 State of gentry — Farmers — Peasantry — Growth of 
 pauperism — Decrease of births and marriages, &c, . 22 
 
IV CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 SINGULAR EXCEPTION. 
 
 PAGK 
 
 Superiority of Ulster — In manufacture, commerce, agri- 
 culture, <fec. — Object of this volume, . . . .32 
 
 PART II.— ALLEGED CAUSES. 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 THE PHYSICAL. 
 
 The Country — Soil — Climate — Resources, etc. The Race 
 — Celt and Saxon — Wales — Highlands — Irish mind, 
 and heart, &c, 39 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 THE POLITICAL. 
 
 The Agitator — Natural history of agitation — O'Connell 
 — Ulster, &c The Legislature — The constitution — 
 Laws — Repeal — " Misrule," &,c, 63 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 THE SOCIAL. 
 
 Habits — Feudalism — Style — Extravagance, <fcc. Pur- 
 suits — Trade — Agriculture — Rack rents — Tenant- 
 right, &c, 64 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 THE MORAL. 
 
 Knowledge — General and religious ignorance — Super- 
 stitions, <fec. &c. Virtue — Military, police, and crim- 
 inal statistics — Consequent disorganization, &c. <fcc. 
 Contrast in Ulster — Light — Morality, &c. &c, . 77 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 THE RELIGIOUS. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 The Coincidence— Superiority of Protestantism in Eng- 
 land, Scotland, Ireland's provinces, counties, parishes, 
 towns, people. The Inference— the key of history 
 in Ireland, Europe, (fee. (fee., 93 
 
 PART III.— THE GRAND CAUSE. 
 
 Basis of demonstration, .... 109 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 ROME ECLIPSES THE MIND. 
 
 The Bible in Ireland — Altar harangues— Maynooth train- 
 ing — Priestly instructions — Impostures — Miracles — 
 Rome the enemy of all light— Congregation of the In- 
 dex—Parent of barbarism— Fruits in Ireland, (fee. (fee., 112 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 ROME CORRUPTS THE CONSCIENCE. 
 
 Principles — Absolution — Confession, (fee. (fee. Irish 
 Priesthood — Profane swearing — Drunkenness — Sab- 
 bath-breaking— Adultery, (fee. Ac Irish People— 
 Frequency of crime — Its atrocity, (fee. (fee, . . .132 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 ROME DESTROYS THE HEART. 
 
 Her hatred of the Bible— Payments— Tortures— Lough 
 Derg— Purgatory— Priestly foragings— Robberies- 
 Butcheries— In Ireland and all countries— Truculent 
 spirit unchanged, (fee. (fee 151 
 
VI CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 ROME DEBASES THE WHOLE NATURE. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Makes mental imbeciles, social cripples, moral slaves — 
 Dreadful engines of subjugation — Women — Convents 
 — Confessional — Degradation — Filth — Improvidence 
 — Idleness — Beggars, in Ireland and all Popish lands, 
 <fec. <fec, 170 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 ROME BLASTS MAN'S TEMPORAL STATE. 
 
 Financial Curse of Ireland — Destroys prosperity — 
 Robs community, <fec. &c. Physical Curse — Effect on 
 soil, climate, race, <fcc. Social Curse — Paralyzes en- 
 ergies, perpetuates feudalism, aggravates landlord 
 tyranny, &c. Political Curse — Curses our civil bless- 
 ings — Trial by jury — Elective franchise, &c. — Creates 
 agitation, despotism, Ac. &c, 189 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 ROME CLOUDS MAN'S ETERNAL PROSPECTS. 
 
 Protestant pseudo-Liberals — Paganism of Popery — Po- 
 pish mummeries — A scene of devotion — Sacerdotal 
 piety — The heaven of Rome — Her saints and sinners, 
 &c. <fec, 212 
 
 PART IV.— THE CURE. 
 
 Recapitulation — " The Mystery Solved," . . . 227 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 THE MEDICINE THE POPULAR REMEDIES. 
 
 The Civil — The Land question — Ireland unfit for lib- 
 erty — The mockery of freedom, <fec. The Educational 
 
 »— 
 
CONTENTS. VU 
 
 PAGE 
 
 — National Board — Sectarian zealots — Godless phi- 
 losophers — Insufficiency of mere education, (fee. The 
 Industrial — Industrial Schemes — Advantages — De- 
 fects, Ac. — The Scriptural — Touching incident — The 
 two atmospheres — Power of the Bible — Its amazing 
 triumphs — Glory of Britain, (fee, .... 230 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 THE MEDICINE THE GRAND SPECIFIC. 
 
 Philosophy of the Gospel — Indispensable to virtue, hap- 
 piness, and general improvement of mankind — Atone- 
 ment — Regeneration — True Catholicon — Monstrous 
 folly of endowing Maynooth — Fruits of the Gospel — 
 Awakens the mind — Purines the. conscience — Gives a 
 heart — Elevates the whole nature — Blesses for time, 
 and eternity — A word to our statesmen, . . . 257 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 THE TREATMENT INFORMATION. 
 
 Protestant ignorance— The practical of Rome— Its Sa- 
 tanic philosophy — The eclectic system of evil — Rome's 
 tactics in these lands — Blustering, cumiing — Hatred 
 of, and designs on England, (fee, .... 282 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 THE TREATMENT LEGISLATION. 
 
 Rome a temporal power — The Convents — Their decoys 
 
 — Their horrors — Our duty. Maynooth College 
 
 Its history — Course of Instruction — Moral influence — 
 Endowment — Infatuation of our rulers — Duty of the 
 people, (fee. (fee, t 293 
 
CHAPTER V. 
 
 THE TREATMENT EVANGELIZATION. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Ireland's grand hope — Past neglect — Missionary statis- 
 tics — The Irish Society — Dingle — Achill — Birr — 
 " Irish Schools" — " Scriptural and Industrial Schools" 
 — Awakening in Connaught, (fee. — The grand requisite 
 — Revival in the Churches — Prayer — Faith — Wisdom 
 — Union, (fee., 315 
 
 CONCLUDING APPEAL. 
 
 Alarming progress of Popery — Increase of Irish in Eng- 
 land — Scotland — Australia — America, (fee. — Hope for 
 Ireland — Evangelization — Emigration — Immigration, 
 (fee. (fee, 335 
 
 
THE MYSTERY SOLVI D, &c 
 
 PART I. 
 THE MISERIES. 
 
 APPEARANCE OF THE COUNTRY COMMERCE 
 
 MANUFACTURES* 
 
 The present condition of Ireland is perhaps with- 
 out a parallel amongst the nations of the earth. 
 
 Misery has long been this country's peculiar 
 portion. Her history has been written with tears 
 and blood. Her children are familiar with sack- 
 cloth and ashes. But in God's awful providence 
 she seems at length to have reached the climax of 
 woe ; and is now passing through such a complication 
 of miseries, as has excited the astonishment and 
 pity of the world. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 GENERAL wretchedness. 
 
 The first thing that strikes the traveller, is the 
 air of desolation which begins to pervade whole dis- 
 
10 THE MISERIES. 
 
 tricts — especially in Munster and Connaught. As 
 he wanders through these provinces, he sees half- 
 decayed towns, which once were so flourishing as to 
 send members to the Irish parliament. He finds 
 whole villages in ruins so complete, that nothing 
 remains but a few tottering wall-steads, to tell that 
 the hum of life was ever there. In some cases, 
 even these monuments of desolation have disap- 
 peared, and the coachman points to a bare deserted 
 spot, as the site of a former hamlet. And as to the 
 destruction of farmsteads and cabins, he can scarce 
 move in any direction but the scene appears as if 
 some invading army had passed by. 
 
 He finds, on inquiry, that this decadence had 
 commenced long prior to the famine, and was only 
 hastened by that fearful visitation. On the eve of 
 that calamity, and while yet the tide of events flowed 
 in its usual channels, Ireland contained one third 
 the population, with one fourth the surface of the 
 United Kingdom ; and yet her national revenue was 
 not one eleventh, being £4,500,000 sterling out of 
 £52,000,000. The registered tonnage of her ship- 
 ping was not one twelfth, being 250.000 tons to near 
 3,250.000. And the proportion of persons employed 
 in her factories was one twenty-third, being, in, round 
 numbers, 23,000 to 540,000 ;* while her agricultural 
 condition could scarce be compared to Britain's — 
 
 * See Thorn's Irish Statistics for 1849, pp. 54, 55, 1^*7, 
 1*78, 182; Oliver and Boyd's Edinburgh Almanac for 1848. 
 pp. 141, 142. 
 
GENERAL WRETCHEDNESS. H 
 
 there being then in Ireland near 1,000,000 of hold- 
 ings on 1 3,500,000 of acres of arable surface. And 
 of these holdings, one seventh did not exceed 1 acre 
 each ; one third consisted of from 1 to 5 acres ; not 
 one twentieth were above 50 acres each ; and two 
 thirds, at least, were wretchedly cultivated.* 
 
 If we look to the circumstances of the population 
 of that period, our results are not less remarkable. 
 While the English upper classes have long been the 
 wealthiest in the world, few of the Irish were even 
 out of debt, and numbers were hopelessly embar- 
 rassed. While the English middle classes have 
 long been surrounded with comforts, Ireland can 
 scarce be said to have ever had a middle class. 
 And of the few that even then existed, the means 
 were so slender, that often the Irish merchant was 
 poorer than the English clerk ; and the Irish farmer 
 would have been thankful for the food which Eng- 
 lish servants threw away ; while the entire agricul- 
 tural class, representing seven tenths of Ireland's 
 substance, were fast sinking into poverty. How 
 then, shall we compare the lower classes of both 
 countries — the starved Irish peasant in his wretched 
 hut, with the happy English hind in his cheerful 
 cottage % More than three fourths of all the dwell- 
 ings in Ireland were at that period built of mud. 
 Near one half of all the families in Ireland lived in 
 dwellings of but one apartment each.f Two thirds 
 
 * See Thorn's Statistics, 1849, pp. 168, 169. 
 f Census for 1841. 
 
12 THE MISERIES. 
 
 of the entire population lived by manual labor, and 
 subsisted on potatoes. Near one third were out of 
 work, and in distress thirty weeks in the year;* 
 while not less than one eighth were paupers, or on 
 the very verge of pauperism. 
 
 We think no one can read these statistics without 
 being able to account for all the horrors of the 
 famine of 1847. No prosperous country could be 
 utterly prostrated by the failure of one crop — least 
 of all, the potato — for no prosperous country depends 
 upon it. It is the staple food of poverty or sloth. 
 That nation must have been foundering, which such 
 a calamity could so completely engulf. The above 
 statistics demonstrate that Ireland ivas foundering 
 — that the people were already so impoverished, as 
 to be unable to bear any additional privations ; and 
 many of them, indeed, so sunk in the gulf of wretch- 
 edness, that the least rise of its waters was sure to 
 overwhelm them. 
 
 The census of 1851 has accordingly shown the 
 disastrous effects of the famine upon Ireland. Ten 
 years before, the population was 8,175,124. At the 
 same rate of increase which had marked all previ- 
 ous decennial periods, it should at least have been 
 9,000,000 in 1851 ; and many believed it had reached 
 that number in 1846. Yet it was found to be only 
 6,515,794 — thus revealing the astounding fact, that 
 in five years, the population of Ireland had virtually 
 decreased two millions and a half, or near one 
 
 * Third Report, Poor Inquiry Commission. 
 
r — ■ 
 
 GENERAL WRETCHEDNESS. 13 
 
 third ! This number is within about 370,000 of 
 being equal to the entire population of Scotland. 
 We have only, therefore, to imagine the almost total 
 extinction of the Scottish nation, in order to form 
 some estimate of our loss. Moreover, in the year 
 1841, there were 1,384,360 dwellings in Ireland. 
 According to the census of 1851, the number was 
 then reduced to 1.115,007, — showing, that in the 
 mean time, no less than 269,353 of all the habita- 
 tions of the country had been levelled to the ground ! 
 We find, from the same source of information, that 
 this dreadful clearance has chiefly taken place among 
 the small farmers — that humble class so graphically 
 described by the poet, whose little plot 
 
 " Just gave what life required, but gave no more." 
 
 In 1845 there were, as already stated, near 1,000,000 
 of holdings in Ireland ; and of this number, those 
 which contained from 1 to 5 acres each, amounted 
 to 310,436, and supported 1,862,250 individuals — 
 more than one fifth of the population. The census 
 of 1851 has revealed the awful fact, that near three 
 fourths of this entire class have been swept away — 
 there being then but 91,618 holdings, supporting 
 549,708 individuals ! We find, moreover, that of 
 all the holdings which were under 15 acres each, 
 one half have disappeared, involving the clearance 
 of 1.500,000 souls. All this in a few short years ! 
 yet even now, the depopulation goes on as rapidly as 
 ever. Who that has a heart can read these details 
 
14 THE MISERIES. 
 
 without emotion ? Near two hundred and sev- 
 enty thousand dwellings swept away ! And in 
 these the pulse of affection once beat warmly ; for 
 nature has endowed the peasant with feelings as well 
 as the prince. To these, the poor man proudly 
 brought his bride. In these, they no doubt spent 
 years of humble contentment, cheered amidst their 
 sorrows by each other's love. There the mother has 
 smiled over her infant's cradle, and perhaps wept 
 over its coffin too ; and the hardy father lias had his 
 toils beguiled by the innocent prattle of his little 
 ones. And there, too, have they often knelt around 
 their dying embers, and in their own humble way 
 and simple strains presented their evening prayer to 
 heaven ! 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 the famine. 
 
 Such are the general statistics of our depopula- 
 tion — the brevity of this sketch forbids minuter de- 
 tails. It is enough to say, that of the above 2.500,- 
 000. the famine destroyed about 1.000,000. and emi- 
 gration has removed the remainder ; and let any one 
 imagine, if he can, the scenes of woe embraced in 
 these fearful figures ! During the horrors of 1847, 
 our country was transformed into a grave-yard and 
 a lazar-house. It was quite common to see the peo- 
 
THE FAMINE. 15 
 
 pie staggering like drunken men along the roads 
 from the utter exhaustion of nature, their faces and 
 legs being swollen with hunger ; and pages might be 
 filled with the bare record of cases the most aifect- 
 ing, of starvation, pestilence, and death. Let us 
 just present the reader with an instance or two. 
 At Killalla, the famished creatures used to crowd 
 round the house of the Rev. Mr. Rogers, wolfish 
 with hunger ; and men once athletic and muscular 
 would stand before his windows, take the skin which 
 once covered a brawny arm. but now hung loose and 
 wrinkled, and double it round the bone in order to 
 prove the extent of their emaciation ! One woman 
 was found stretched on the bed by the side of her 
 dead husband, and after having just given birth to a 
 poor wasted infant. It was not uncommon to find 
 whole families dead in their cabins together. Nor 
 were cases rare in which the famished creatures be- 
 came deranged before expiring ; and in one such in- 
 stance, the most awful of all the occurrences pre- 
 dicted against the Jews, was found to have taken 
 place — the delirious mother had fed on her dead in- 
 fant ! Our missionaries were doomed to witness 
 daily the most heart-rending scenes. The Rev. Mr. 
 Brannigan one day observed a man and his wife dig- 
 ging in a stubble field. He approached and inquired 
 what they were doing. They told him they had five 
 children, whom they had for a fortnight supported 
 on cabbage and mill-dust, but that they were now 
 actually starving ; that for the last two days they 
 
i6 THE MISERIES. 
 
 had kept them in bed to try to sleep off the hunger ; 
 and that they had that day been out from the early 
 morning in quest of some wild roots, of which they 
 exhibited a handful as the fruits of their protracted 
 labors. Mr. Brannigan was moved, and, uttering 
 some kind words, he handed them two shillings. 
 This relief coming so unexpectedly on the poor man 
 weakened as he was by sorrow and hunger, com- 
 pletely unmanned him. and he sobbed and wept in 
 the minister's face ; while his wife, still less able to 
 control her feelings, clasped her husband in her arms, 
 exclaiming — " My dear ! our children won't die yet." 
 And yet these are mere samples. How many scenes 
 more tragic still were enacted during that dreadful 
 calamity, which no chronicle has ever recorded, of 
 whose existence the world never heard, and over 
 which no tears of sympathy were shed, except per- 
 haps by some fellow-sufferers ! Nor must we forget 
 that, in consequence of the partial failure of the po- 
 tato ever since 1847, many districts have been suf- 
 fering an annual famine, and have now, therefore, al- 
 most equalled Egypt's seven years of dearth without 
 its previous seven of plenty. 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 EMIGRATION. 
 
 For many years a large portion of Ireland's ship- 
 ping trade has been mere emigration. And its ag- 
 
EMIGRATION. 17 
 
 gregate amount can be best seen from the fact that, 
 according to a late estimate, there are in America 
 3,000.000 of native Irish, and 4,500.000 more of 
 Irish descent. In other words, America now con- 
 tains of inhabitants of Irish blood, 1,000,000 more 
 than does Ireland itself! Even previous to the 
 famine of 1847, the annual number of emigrants 
 had in six years steadily risen from 40,000 to 
 95,000 ; and since that time it has increased so 
 prodigiously, that the Colonial Land and Emigra- 
 tion Commissioners give the number emigrating in 
 1851 at 279,000. The daily arrivals of emigrants 
 at the port of New York alone, range from 700 to 
 1000, and of these the great mass are Irish. Thus, 
 after flowing westward for half a century, the stream 
 of emigration, so far from diminishing, has swollen 
 into a mighty flood, and the world now gazes on a 
 phenomenon which can only be likened to the mi- 
 grations of the Gauls or the Huns, or other wander- 
 ing tribes of yore. Multitudes are flying from their 
 once loved homesteads, as though Ireland were the 
 scene of some physical as well as social convulsion, 
 to a land which comprises all they can henceforth 
 call a country ; deeming even its wild forests an 
 asylum from their woes. They daily hear of the 
 untimely end of thousands of their fellow-emigrants 
 by shipwreck on the passage, or hardships on their 
 arrival ; but so far is every other feeling overborne 
 by the one desire to escape, that the most timid 
 brave the deep, and the most infirm encounter the 
 
 2 
 
THE MISERIES. 
 
 hardships. Of the crowds that thus hurry along in 
 this general " exodus," scarce one returns, save the 
 few who come back from ill health or indolence, 
 nulla vestigia retrorstim ; so that a large portion 
 of the country's business arises from emigration. 
 From it our railways are reaping a transient and 
 ruinous harvest — the numbers continually pouring 
 along the Great Southern and Western alone are 
 surprising. And seacoast villages, which vessels 
 were never known to touch before, ships now regu- 
 larly visit for their human cargoes. Churches and 
 chapels are fast being emptied. The country begins 
 to feel the fearful drain, and faints from excessive 
 depletion ; yet on goes the increasing tide, and on it 
 promises to go. In many cases the wail of the emi- 
 grants who crowd our ports is not so heart-rending 
 as that of their friends whom poverty compels to 
 remain behind ; and had the people but the means 
 of getting away, whole districts would rise and take 
 their departure. Even the warmest advocates of 
 the clearance-system begin to feel alarmed. Instead 
 of a competition for land, as formerly, there has at 
 length commenced a competition for tenants ; and 
 some are seriously speaking of the necessity for par- 
 liamentary interference with the emigrant, to save 
 the country from complete depopulation — it being a 
 matter truly of easy enough calculation, that at the 
 same increasing rate of emigration, a very few years 
 indeed would leave Ireland a lonesome solitude. 
 Here is a state of things as mournful as it is un- 
 
EMIGRATION. 19 
 
 paralleled. We refer not so much to the previous 
 dreadful hardships which such a general flight im- 
 plies ; when, by a people proverbially attached to 
 home, a Canadian log-hut is now deemed a blessing ; 
 when the spell of country is so completely broken, 
 that America, once their last resource, is now the 
 goal of their hopes ; and what used to be dreaded 
 as a land of exile, is now sighed for as a place of 
 refuge. Nor do we refer so much to the anguish 
 endured by our warm-hearted countrymen when 
 thus torn from their humble, but yet beloved home- 
 steads ! What this must be, the heart-rending cries 
 of the emigrants who throng our quays but too pain- 
 fully show ; or their still more bitter wail, when 
 taking their last farewell of those homely abodes 
 which were endeared to them by a thousand recol- 
 lections ! Not surely that these woes are to be 
 overlooked or underrated ; on the contrary, they 
 must command the deepest sympathy of our nature. 
 He cannot be a man who could witness such scenes 
 without emotion, or feeling all that our native poet 
 has so touchingly expressed — 
 
 '• Good Heaven ! what sorrows gloomed that parting day 
 That called them from their native walks away ; 
 When the poor exiles, every pleasure past, 
 Hung round the bowers, and fondly looked their last ; 
 And shuddering still to face the distant deep, 
 Returned and wept, and still returned to weep." 
 
 Most affecting of all is it to see amongst those 
 
20 THE MISERIES. 
 
 mournful groups, not the young and active merely, 
 but many a poor old man who had hoped to lay his 
 bones in his fathers' sepulchre : — to see trembling 
 old age thus turned out on the world when almost 
 leaving it ; doomed to recommence life's pilgrimage 
 at its close ; and forced to encounter hardships fit 
 only for elastic youth, and beneath which gray hairs 
 are all but sure to sink. But we refer not now to 
 these calamities. 
 
 We allude rather to the moral and social evils of 
 this unnatural state of things. For many years it 
 has been the very flower of the people who have 
 been leaving — our enterprising upright yeomanry — 
 who were not content to live on dry potatoes. It is 
 the bones and sinews of the country we have been 
 losing, who, besides contributing their labor and skill 
 to America's national wealth, have been carrying 
 with them each from £10 to £1000. By the depar- 
 ture of this class it is reckoned that since 1845 the 
 country has lost in cash alone about half a million 
 sterling. Thus Ireland has for years been little 
 else than a nursery ground for America, whence the 
 hardiest plants are being annually removed, while 
 the least thriving and healthy are left behind. The 
 cream of the nation has thus for years been flowing 
 off : like some liquid of which the purer portion at 
 the top has been repeatedly drawn away, tilL the 
 very sediment itself begins at length to run off. 
 Such has been the draining process of Irish emigra- 
 tion, on which Britain has looked with indifference, 
 
EMIGRATION. 21 
 
 till now the best of the people are gone to rear cities 
 beneath a foreign banner, and all that remains for 
 England's proud flag to wave over, is the pauperized 
 and prostrated remnant. 
 
 Nor are the political bearings of the case to be 
 wholly disregarded. It were idle to deny that 
 America now holds that place in the hearts of most 
 of our countrymen which England ought to possess. 
 Hearken to their conversation, and America is the 
 theme of their eulogies ; while England is spoken 
 of in terms of invidious contrast, and in a spirit of 
 moody discontent. Never was this fact more clearly 
 proved than during the American ambassador's late 
 visit to Ireland. While at a recent festival in Lim- 
 erick, the health of our beloved Queen was received 
 with hisses by some of the party, the people every- 
 where gave Mr. Abbot Lawrence a royal reception, 
 and flocked around him as though he had been a 
 visitant from some better world. In truth, the 
 hearts of the people are now in America, Enter 
 almost any dwelling, and the great aim of the very 
 servants is to save what will " take them out of this 
 country" to that land of promise. Converse with 
 our struggling farmers, and the last hope of many is 
 that their sons, who have gone before, may be spared 
 to send for themselves and their families, and enable 
 them to exchange the condition of British subjects 
 for that of American citizens. Follow that youth to 
 those distant shores, and you find him sustained 
 amid their summer droughts and winter snows by 
 
22 THE MISERIES. 
 
 the hope of soon rescuing his revered parent from 
 hunger and " oppression," and welcoming him to 
 that " land of liberty" and wealth. 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 INCREASING PROSTRATION. 
 
 Such is the history of the millions we have lost — 
 let us now glance at the state of the millions who 
 remain. It would be some consolation for the loss 
 of the former, if, as many hoped, it would have con- 
 duced to the good of the latter. According to our 
 over-population theorists, Ireland was like some over- 
 crowded ship; and what was chiefly necessary to 
 save her from sinking, was simply to lighten her of 
 her human cargo. Well, this has been done, and to 
 their hearts' content — has it enabled her to weather 
 the tempest? 
 
 Look to our upper classes, and how many of those 
 who were embarrassed in 1846 are absolute bank- 
 rupts now ! Their property has so fast been passing 
 through the Encumbered Estates' Court, that 2000 
 petitions have already been presented, of which 
 1600 have been fiated ; and yet it is the opinion of 
 many that the labors of that court are only com- 
 mencing. You now pass by numbers of decaying 
 mansions which were once the homes of splendid 
 hospitality ; you see their magnificent demesnes neg- 
 
INCREASING PROSTRATION. 23 
 
 lected, and their various monuments of elegance 
 fast going to ruin. And you find the only tenant of 
 their Jonely halls to be, perhaps some Chancery 
 keeper, or else some old caretaker of the family, who 
 entertains you with stories of its ancient " grandeur." 
 Some of these dwellings have been turned into poor- 
 houses— sad emblem of our country's state! — and 
 those who were once their lords are now penniless 
 exiles in distant lands, or earning a pittance in some 
 department of the public service. The sons of sev- 
 eral of our gentry have been glad to enter the con- 
 stabulary as common policemen, and a few at least 
 are now private soldiers. A baronet is this moment a 
 common turnkey in a prison, and at least one gentleman 
 of high family has been discovered in a poorhouse ! 
 There is something peculiarly affecting in these facts. 
 By a merciful arrangement of Providence, those who 
 have been cradled in hardships are for that very 
 reason best fitted to endure them : but it is pitiful 
 to think of hundreds in actual want who were reared 
 as tenderly as any of our readers, and whose infant 
 locks the rude winds of heaven were scarce ever per- 
 mitted to toss. We have had applications from the 
 daughters of gentlemen, couched in terms enough to 
 make the heart bleed, begging to be made teachers 
 of our industrial schools on £20 a-year. One of our 
 missionaries was some time since sent for to visit a 
 reduced lady who was reported to be dying. He 
 found her in a wretched dwelling, and sinking mainly 
 from sheer privation ; and the only relics of former 
 
24 THE MISERIES. 
 
 years he could see, were a riding habit and a silver- 
 mounted whip, which belonged to a beloved daughter ! 
 And the most affecting feature of the case is, the 
 shifts to which these persons frequently resort in or- 
 der to conceal their distress. In one case, the author 
 accidentally discovered the starving condition of a 
 gentleman with a large family, who had held a high 
 situation in the Customs ; and having at length so 
 far gained his confidence as to induce him to make 
 known his wants, he learned amongst other things 
 that the only covering which the gentleman and his 
 wife had over them at night was an old green baize 
 cloth to which he pointed on the table before him ! 
 
 Look now for an instant to our middle class 
 — or rather to that class which in Ireland comes 
 nearest to what is meant by this term, and embraces 
 not only our merchants, shopkeepers, and higher 
 agriculturists, but our traders, farmers, and private 
 householders, of respectable character, but limited 
 means. There is scarcely any better index of the 
 condition of this class, as well indeed as of all who 
 stand between it and our humblest peasantry, than 
 the state of our savings' banks. Now, in 1845 the 
 number of depositors in the savings' banks of Ireland 
 was 96,422 ; and the amount deposited, £2,921.581 ; 
 whereas in the year 1850 the number of depositors 
 had fallen to 47,987, and the amount deposited to 
 £1,291,798! 
 
 Another most important indication of a country's 
 prosperity or decline, is the amount of its imports 
 
DECREASING PROSTRATION. 25 
 
 and exports. Now, in 1845, when we had a popula- 
 tion of 8,500,000. our exports in grain alone were 
 worth £4.500,000 sterling; yet, in 1850, with only 
 6,500.000 of a population to feed, the value of our 
 corn exports was but £1.500,000 sterling; — in other 
 words, this principal source of our wealth had, in 
 the above brief period, fallen away two thirds ! Nor 
 has this decline been confined to our grain trade. 
 Our exports in cows and pigs amounted in 1846, to 
 above £4.500,000 sterling ; while, in 1850, they had 
 fallen away to £2,200.000, or less than one half. 
 And when it is recollected that seven tenths of Ire- 
 land's wealth is agricultural, these figures but too 
 plainly demonstrate the rapidity of her decline. 
 
 If next we look to the private circumstances of 
 the farmers, we know that their live stock is one of 
 the most important items, and sources, too, of their 
 wealth. Every one knows that much of the value 
 of their farms depends on their ability to stock them 
 well. Now, in 1841, the average of live stock on 
 each holding under fifteen acres, was £9, and the 
 total value on all the farms of this extent in Ireland, 
 was, in round numbers, £10.500,000 sterling; while, 
 in 1851, the average value of live stock on each had 
 fallen to £6 10s., showing that more than one third 
 of this source of our national wealth has also disap- 
 peared. ■ And it has been truly affecting to mark, 
 in so many farmers' dwellings, those sure and steady 
 strides of poverty which the foregoing statistics indi- 
 cate ; to see, first of all, how the farmer's little sav- 
 
26 THE MISERIES. 
 
 ings were gradually drawn from the savings' bank 
 till all was gone — then how his cattle were sold, one 
 by one, till frequently the last cow disappeared — 
 then how his household furniture itself went, piece 
 by piece, and the very apparel of the family began 
 to be sold or pawned ; and how the long-maintained, 
 but fruitless struggle, was finally closed by the poor 
 man giving up his farm on which his fathers had 
 dwelt for generations, and mournfully bending his 
 steps to the poorhouse or the sea-port. The last 
 five years have hence been unexampled for the num- 
 ber of auctions and other sales ; and when so many 
 were selling, and so few able to buy, the sacrifices 
 often made at these were, of course, enormous. Nor 
 have the pawnbrokers been less busily employed 
 than the auctioneers. We have known even their 
 yards and outhouses to be filled with articles from 
 their surrounding neighborhoods. And in some 
 cases they have suffered from the very excess of 
 their stores, so many have been pawning and so few 
 purchasing ! 
 
 Of course, there are many exceptions to this 
 general decline, both in our middle and upper 
 classes. We speak of the majority, though we fear 
 it is the large majority ; for if so many signs of dis- 
 tress appear in those ranks of Irish society whose 
 fondness for keeping up an appearance is so prover- 
 bial, and whose dread of being thought poor is so 
 great, that they would almost rather starve than let 
 their wants be known, we cannot but conclude that, 
 
r 
 
 INCREASING PROSTRATION. 
 
 27 
 
 were we admitted behind the scenes, we would dis- 
 cover an amount of privation which would more than 
 justify the picture we have drawn. 
 
 If, then, such is the condition even <»f our gentry 
 and yeomanry, what can we expect amongst those 
 lower grades from which our vast armies of paupers 
 are chiefly recruited ? Perhaps our poor-law statis- 
 tics will form the best answer to this question. Let 
 the reader just look at the subjoined table.* which 
 marks the progress of our pauperism, with all its 
 ruinous expenditure, for 1 1 short years. From it 
 he will find that, whereas in 1841, the numbers 
 relieved were 31,000, and the cost of relief was 
 £110.000: in 1849, the numbers relieved were no 
 less than 932,000, and the cost of relief near £2,- 
 200,000 ; — that is to say. for eight years the scale 
 continues to ascend till the number of paupers has 
 increased thirtyfold, and the cost of relieving them 
 
 Year. 
 
 Expenditure. 
 
 1841 . 
 
 . . £110,278 
 
 1842 . 
 
 281,233 
 
 1843 . 
 
 244,374 
 
 1844 . 
 
 271,334 
 
 1845 . 
 
 . . 316,025 
 
 1846 . 
 
 435,001 
 
 1847 . 
 
 803.686 
 
 1848 . . 
 
 . 1,835,634 
 
 1849 . . 
 
 . 2,177,651 
 
 1850 . . 
 
 . 1,430,108 
 
 1851 . . 
 
 . 1,110,892 
 
 Paupers. 
 31,108 
 87,604 
 87,898 
 105.358 
 114,205 
 243,933 
 417,139 
 610,463 
 932,284 
 805,702 
 768,570 
 Thom's Statistics, 1852, p. 203. 
 
28 THE MISERIES. 
 
 twentyfold ! Indeed, in 1848, the number receiving 
 relief, including out-door paupers, exceeded 2,000 - 
 000, or a fourth of the population ; and if the last 
 two years exhibit a diminution, we fear this is to be 
 ascribed to something else than returning prosperity. 
 A depopulation of 2.500.000 should alone go far to 
 explain the phenomenon ; while the country is so 
 fast sinking beneath a load of poor-rates, that in 
 several poorhouses it is found impossible to accom- 
 modate the paupers of the district ; and those who 
 find admittance, in many cases perish in such num- 
 bers from their miserable maintenance, that they 
 begin to shun the poorhouse as a sepulchre. In two 
 houses alone, those of Ennistymon and Kilrush, 
 there died in the year ending March, 1851, 3,028 
 paupers, being at the rate of 4 deaths a day in the 
 one house, and A\ in the other ! The state of our 
 poorhouses, therefore, is no certain criterion of the 
 state of our pauperism. Some of our Unions are 
 insolvent, and many are in debt ; while the poor-rate 
 is so fast hastening the general decay, that a num- 
 ber of the rate-payers of one year are uniformly 
 found among the paupers of the next. The poor- 
 houses built only 12 years ago, with ample accom- 
 modation for the estimated wants of the time, have 
 in many places been found so inadequate as to have 
 added to them three and four auxiliary ivorJJtouscs. 
 A large portion of the town of Millstreet is at pres- 
 ent thus occupied by paupers ; yet our poorhouse 
 accommodation is still so deficient, that we fear the 
 
INCREASING PROSTRATION. 29 
 
 foregoing table scarce indicates three fourths of the 
 existing pauperism of the country. 
 
 This prodigious amount of pauperism, embracing 
 near one sixth of the population, is yet but too easily 
 accounted for by a glance at the state of the peas- 
 antry. While the average wages of the English 
 laborer is abcftit Is 6c/. per day. that of the Irish 
 laborer is about 6c/. : it occasionally rises to 10c/. and 
 Is. ; it is often as low as 3d. and 4c/. ; and, in the 
 slack seasons, numbers are content to work for their 
 food. We have seen that, for weeks together, they 
 are unemployed : and in the west particularly the 
 labor market is so wretched, that you will see them 
 bringing ass's loads of turf and of chickweed for 
 several miles into town, and selling them for \d. or 
 Id., and a messenger will gladly travel 10 or 12 
 miles for 6c/. Their food is of the poorest descrip- 
 tion. Before the famine, it consisted chiefly of po- 
 tatoes, with sometimes milk, often herrings, rarely 
 meat, and frequently nothing ; but since the famine, 
 it largely consists of Indian meal stirabout, and this 
 frequently but twice a-day : and most thankful are 
 some of them to get even this. We have known 
 them to live for weeks on boiled turnips or cabbage ; 
 and by the seaside you will see women daily dispersed 
 along the strand in quest of mussels or limpets, or 
 whatever else they can find. You examine their 
 dwellings, and as you gaze on those wretched hovels, 
 with their straw roofs rotten and leaky, their floors 
 soaked with damp, and the green glut from the thatch 
 
30 TIIE MISERIES. 
 
 often streaking their walls, you wonder how human 
 beings can possibly exist in them ! In truth, their 
 accumulated hardships have, since the famine, wrought 
 a melancholy change on this once hardy race. The 
 children are now generally wasted and sallow, the 
 parents have a famished look, disease is much more 
 frequent, and longevity is daily becoming rarer. There 
 are very few cabins which have not, within the last 
 five years, been scenes of sickness or death ; and you 
 have only to enter and inquire for some parent or 
 child, to be pointed to a wasted patient on a sickbed, 
 or to the neighboring graveyard. Hence the num- 
 ber of orphans is now quite remarkable. You will 
 meet them by scores in the poorhouses and begging 
 along the roads ; and we fear it is this mournful fact 
 which, in a great measure, accounts for another far 
 more deplorable — that juvenile prostitution has of 
 late been increasing. 
 
 Nor has the distress of our peasantry failed to 
 show itself in other affecting forms. It is indeed 
 the last symptom of an expiring country and a fam- 
 ished people, when not only is the voice of the 
 bridegroom and of the bride ceasing to be heard 
 therein, but even that of the new-born babe. Yet, 
 since the year 1847, the annual number of marriages 
 in Ireland is reckoned to have decreased one third, 
 and the number of births to have proportionally de- 
 clined ; while in many cases the wasted appearance 
 of both mother and offspring is truly affecting to 
 behold, and the powers of nature have been so far 
 
INCREASING PROSTRATION. 31 
 
 exhausted, that abortions are of frequent occurrence. 
 It is also asserted, that in some districts lunacy it- 
 self is increasing. In a word, life has become with 
 many a desperate struggle to live. Even our enor- 
 mous poor-rates, while beggaring the country, have 
 not yet left our paupers the alternative of a poor- 
 house or a grave ; for deaths from starvation are still 
 of frequent occurrence. Nay, even reduced below 
 the alternative of flying to a foreign land or dying in 
 their own, it has been proved that several prisoners 
 committed the crimes they stood charged with, in 
 order to obtain the privilege of transportation. 
 
 We shall now only add the marvellous fact, that 
 all this decay has been proceeding in an age which, 
 for general advancement, has been termed the age 
 of wonders, and that Ireland has been thus fearfully 
 retrograde in the very swiftest hour of the world's 
 onward march. During the same period in which 
 Britain has been rising to the highest pinnacle of 
 greatness, Ireland, by her side, and beneath the 
 same sceptre, has been sinking to this deep degrada- 
 tion : until now, the one is the mistress and the 
 other the mendicant of the world ; the name of the 
 one is a glory commanding the respect of the na- 
 tions, and that of the other a byeword commanding 
 at best their commiseration. In the same time in 
 which America has been transformed from a wild 
 forest of Indians into a land of unparalleled pros- 
 perity, our people have grown so utterly wretched as 
 to fly to her backwoods as to an asylum, to accept 
 
32 THE MISERIES. 
 
 of her menial employments as a boon, and after be- 
 ing in many cases masters at home, to be thankful 
 for the post of hired servants there. And what 
 crowns the case is, that not only has this national 
 consumption bid defiance to every form of treat- 
 ment, but it seems rather to have grown worse under 
 each successive remedy, and now appears likely to 
 be arrested by nothing but dissolution. Each new 
 measure has only blasted our hopes — each fresh 
 loan has but increased our burdens — each remedial 
 experiment has miserably failed, and often proved a 
 curse rather than a cure : — until now our social mal- 
 adies have reached such a height, that unless in some 
 way arrested by God's gracious providence, in a few 
 more years our country's funeral dirge must inevi- 
 tably be heard. 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 SINGULAR EXCEPTION. 
 
 To this general scene of wretchedness we must 
 notice a partial, yet remarkable exception. The 
 province of Ulster has long presented so strange a 
 contrast to the rest of Ireland, as to have elicited 
 the surprise even of continental tourists. Though 
 warmed by the same sun, and watered by the same 
 skies, this one province has prospered while the rest 
 have declined ; and you have only to cross the boun- 
 
SINGULAR EXCEPTION. 33 
 
 dary lino which divides them, to find a comparative 
 desert on the one side and garden on the other. 
 
 If you look to Ulster's condition prior to the fam- 
 ine, you find it has long been the home of comfort 
 and industry, and the headquarters of our commerce 
 and manufactures. Of the 22,59 1 persons employed 
 in our factories in 1846, nearly four fifths belonged 
 to our northern province ; the proportions being — 
 Ulster, 1 7,304 ; Leinster, 3,732; Minister, 1,155 ; 
 and in Connaught not a single one. To give one 
 example of the relative progress of our northern and 
 southern towns. In 1786, Belfast was an unimpor- 
 tant place with a wretched harbor, and the revenue 
 of its port was but £1,500,000 sterling. In 1838 it 
 contained 50 factory steam-engines; in 1841, its 
 mills for spinning linen yarn alone amounted to 25, 
 one of the principal employing 800 hands ; in 1846, 
 the Tidal Harbor Commissioners pronounced it " the 
 first town in Ireland for enterprise and commercial 
 prosperity ;" and in 1850, its port revenues had in- 
 creased to £29,000,000. On the other hand, Kil- 
 kenny was an important city when Belfast was a vit 
 lage ; it once had several factories, 1 1 water-wheels, 
 and such a carpet manufactory that Kidderminster 
 petitioned for repeal of the Union. In 1834, Mr. 
 Inglis saw one man in the principal factory which 
 once employed 200 ; and he adds, that of the 1 1 
 water-wheels one was going, not for the purpose of 
 driving the machinery, but to prevent it from rot- 
 ting ! 3 
 
34 THE MISERIES. 
 
 If you next turn to the period of the famine, those 
 scenes of horror which were so common in the south 
 were scarcely known in the north of Ireland; and 
 many of those who did perish there were natives of 
 Connaught and Leinster who poured into Ulster in 
 quest of food. Of £10,000,000 of relief sent to Ire- 
 land at that period by public and private charity, 
 scarce £1,000,000 is supposed to have reached Ulster; 
 while that province actually contributed large sums 
 for the relief of the south and west, and has ever 
 since paid the rate-in-aid tax for the same end. 
 Finally, if you look to its condition since 1847, you 
 find that those calamities which have prostrated 
 Minister and Connaught have fallen upon it with but 
 mitigated severity. While Ireland has lost one 
 fifth of its inhabitants, Munster almost one fourth, 
 and Connaught nearly one third, Ulster has not lost 
 one-sixth. Its capital, Belfast, which in 1841 con- 
 tained above 75,000 inhabitants, had risen in 1851 
 to near 100,000, showing an increase of upwards of 
 24,000 ! In fact, the population of Ulster is now 
 relatively greater than it was before the famine — 
 consisting in 1841 of above one fourth, and in 1851 
 near one third of Ireland's inhabitants. Of the 
 government advances made during the famine, the 
 entire of the country owes near £4,500,000 : of this 
 Ulster owes little more than £500,000, or one eighth 
 of the debt to near one third of the population. Its 
 pauperism is not half so g/eat as that of the other 
 provinces ; its proportion of the entire poor-rates of 
 
SINGULAR EXCEPTION. 35 
 
 the country being also about an eighth. In a word, 
 you find that Ulster, though exposed to every ordi- 
 nary influence felt by Minister and Connaught, has 
 scarce known the miseries which have given "them 
 such fearful notoriety. So soon as you enter that 
 province, the entire aspect of the country changes. 
 All around assumes that air of social health which is 
 so easily perceived yet so difficult fully to describe. 
 You have left behind the region of filthy cabins and 
 swarming beggars, ruined villages and deserted farms ; 
 and you enter a territory of comparatively rich cul- 
 tivation, studded with comfortable dwellings and 
 thrifty towns. And you cannot but feel that, from 
 whatever cause, Ulster is at least fifty years ahead 
 of its sister provinces in all the true elements of na- 
 tional progress ; and in its general aspect, so much 
 more resembles Britain than Ireland, that one could 
 almost fancy some physical convulsion to have sev- 
 ered it from the one island and attached it to the 
 other. 
 
 Such is Ireland's temporal condition. We now 
 proceed to that question which has been so frequently 
 asked and so variously answered — What is the cause 
 of such fearful wretchedness, particularly of the 
 marvellous contrast we have traced between one of 
 our provinces and all the rest ? What makes Ire- 
 land a desert and Ulster its only oasis 1 or how came 
 the Newry mountains to form the boundary line be- 
 tween the abodes of comfort and the haunts of woe ? 
 
36 THE MISERIES. 
 
 On this subject how much has been written, yet 
 how little seems to be understood ! Each successive 
 writer has found out the u true cause" of our mise- 
 ries, and of course the infallible specific : yet these 
 have been endlessly various and often directly op- 
 posite. In truth, to Ireland's other misfortunes this 
 also has been added, that she has long been the 
 practice-ground of social and political theorists. 
 Never was laboratory tjtae scene of more experiments, 
 nor patient the victim of blinder quackery. Until 
 now the only parallel to her case seems that of the 
 woman who spent all her living on physicians, " and 
 was nothing the better, but rather grew worse." The 
 result, of course, has been calamitous. Not only 
 has a vast amount of talent and treasure been wasted 
 on Ireland which, if wisely applied, might ere now, 
 under God, have achieved her salvation, but not a 
 little of what was meant as medicinal has proved ab- 
 solutely poisonous ; and, untaught by the experience 
 of the past, many of our most intelligent philanthro- 
 pists and statesmen are to this very hour hanging 
 over our expiring country, — perplexed about the 
 treatment, because ignorant, of the grand disease. 
 
 How long and anxiously have we looked for some 
 one to arise and dispel this ignorance forever ! — 
 some one who would trace out the cause of Ireland's 
 miseries with such clearness and candor, as would 
 leave ignorance nothing to mistake, and bigotry 
 nothing to say. No such person having as yet ap- 
 peared, and our country meanwhile sinking at a 
 
SINGULAR EXCEPTION. 37 
 
 rate so fearful, a very humble individual has been 
 urged to undertake a task which can no longer wait 
 for an abler pen. Nothing but the emergency of 
 the case could have secured his consent. But what 
 would be presumption in one class of circumstances 
 becomes imperative duty in another ; and in a crisis 
 like the present, diffidence should yield to higher 
 feelings, and the most obscure emerge from the 
 shade, if he can but render his country the least 
 possible service. 
 
 We crave, then, the reader's candid perusal of the 
 following pages, whatever political or religious creed 
 he may hold. We would especially bespeak for 
 them our countrymen's calm attention. They are 
 penned by one who can yield to none in devotion to 
 his country and distress for her sorrows ; who has 
 spent the best years of his life in seeking her good ; 
 whose heart has often bled for her woes and throb- 
 bed for her future enlargement. He entreats them 
 to lay aside, at least for one brief hour, the spirit 
 of party ; and if not on the high ground of their 
 common country, at least on that of their com- 
 mon calamities, make this small sacrifice at the 
 shrine of reason. Common woes and dangers have 
 united the deadliest foes. The most hostile broth- 
 ers have embraced over a parent's dying bed. And, . 
 oh ! shall ive ever permit the historian to tell, that 
 even the grave, which entombed so many of our 
 countrymen, could not bury along with them our 
 feuds and dissensions ; that these alone were flour- 
 
38 THE MISERIES. 
 
 ishing, when all else around us decayed ; that amid 
 the throes of our expiring country, we could not 
 suspend our suicidal strife ; and therefore that her 
 death was at least hastened by her own children's 
 hands ? 
 
 * # * We may observe once for all, that we have 
 found it impossible, in so small a volume, to notice 
 the numerous sources from which our facts and 
 statistics are derived. But the reader may rely on 
 their correctness. 
 
PART II. 
 
 ALLEGED CAUSES 
 
 The alleged causes of Ireland's miseries may all 
 be classed under the six following heads. Some 
 have ascribed them to something in her physical 
 state ; some, to her political condition ; others, to 
 her social ; others still, to her moral ; while a fifth 
 class has attributed them to her religious character ; 
 and a sixth has ascribed them, in part, to each of 
 these. Let us briefly inquire how far each theory 
 is accordant with truth. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 THE PHYSICAL. 
 
 This branch of our subject divides itself into the 
 People, and the Land of their Birth. Does the 
 cause, then, rest with Ireland or the Irish ? Is the 
 ground cursed with sterility, or the air with pesti- 
 lence 1 Is the climate bleak, or the coast inhospi- 
 table? Is the island a Sahara or a Campagna dj 
 
40 ALLEGED CAUSES. 
 
 Roma ? " Or is the now fashionable theory the cor- 
 rect one, that the race is hopelessly degenerate and 
 spent — that, with them, " misfortune is another name 
 for misconduct" — and that the Irishman, wherever 
 he goes, is pursued by the curse of Cain or Cainaan, 
 and for similar reasons 1 
 
 The Country. — Is the cause, or any part of it, 
 found in the country ? The question scarce deserves 
 an answer. Ireland is as much celebrated for beauty 
 as misfortune. Volumes have been written on its 
 scenery and resources. Swarms of tourists are 
 annually lured to its shores. Poetry, often extrava 
 gant, speaks but sober truth in styling it the 
 " Emerald Isle." And it is the unanimous verdict 
 of mankind, that in all the requisites of national 
 greatness, the entire island, but especially its south- 
 ern province, is perhaps unequalled beneath the 
 sun. 
 
 In truth, here Nature has lavished her stores. If 
 we turn to the climate, Heaven never blessed a land 
 with more genial skies. Its temperature rarely falls 
 below 30° or rises above 75° ; and thus it is pre- 
 served alike from the rigors of northern and the 
 burning .heats of southern climes. Its atmosphere 
 is peculiarly free from disease, and altogether so 
 pure, that till reduced by late hardships, its people 
 were proverbially healthy ; and so mild are the win- 
 ter months of the south particularly, that the invalid 
 takes shelter in its coves from the less kindly airs 
 
THE PHYSICAL. 41 
 
 of Scotland and Ulster. If you look to the soil, it 
 is proverbially fertile. Its fields wave with the 
 finest harvests. Its very mountains are verdure to 
 their summits. Notwithstanding its vast tracts of 
 waste land, and the wretched cultivation of much 
 that is reclaimed, Ireland exports twice as much 
 provisions as it retains for its own population. The 
 mere trade in its agricultural produce employs a 
 fleet of steamers most part of the year ; and you can 
 scarce sit down to a table in Great Britain on which 
 you will not find the produce of its soil. 
 
 Nor is it less bountifully provided with other 
 elements of wealth. It is intersected by the finest 
 rivers. Its bowels teem with the richest minerals. 
 Its coasts swarm with shoals of fish. It contains 
 some of the best harbors in the world ; and .such are 
 its engineering facilities, that there is scarcely a 
 tunnel in all its railways. While, as to still higher 
 commercial advantages, it stands out on the world's 
 highway — the Atlantic — with the fleets of nations 
 daily passing by; and between the old world and 
 the new, as though designed to be their link of com- 
 munication, and enjoy the blessings of both. In a 
 word, on this wretched country the God of Nature 
 has showered his bounties so profusely, that one can 
 scarce help thinking it was designed to be a garden 
 of plenty instead of a land of paupers. You would 
 say, that if on earth there was a spot which He had 
 graciously exempted from the full effects of the 
 curse on '-man's first disobedience," it was this; and 
 
42 ALLEGED CAUSES 
 
 that nothing but some malignant agency could pos- 
 sibly have hindered it from becoming the model and 
 envy of the nations, instead of being their prostrate 
 suppliant. 
 
 Therefore, the country's physical condition, so fai 
 from accounting in the slightest for her miseries, 
 makes them, in truth, more unaccountable. And 
 the contrast between Ulster and Munster, as well 
 as between Britain and Ireland, instead of being 
 thus explained, becomes more perplexing than ever. 
 Plants which even in England require a hot-house, 
 flourish in Ireland in the open air ; whilst Scotland 
 is largely indebted to her even for poultry and vege- 
 tables. And as to other advantages, Nature has 
 given to the south of Ireland the finest river in the 
 three kingdoms — the Shannon ; and the most mag- 
 nificent harbor — Queenstown. Who would compare 
 to the former the Bann, or even the Clyde, or to 
 the latter the slimy port of Belfast, or the sandy 
 entrance to Liverpool ? Whatever u English jeal- 
 ousy" may be thought to have denied us, it has ever 
 conceded that Ireland is naturally the finest of the 
 British isles ; and we shall only add, that Munster 
 is confessedly the richest portion of the island. The 
 farther you travel south, both clime and soil become 
 more kindly. The snow-storms which visit Ulster, 
 are scarce ever seen in Munster ; and the " trap" 
 hills of Antrim can ill be compared to the " golden 
 vales" of Tipperary ; while the same universal award 
 which has conferred on Ireland the title of the 
 
THE PHYSICAL. 43 
 
 " Green Isle," and on Munster that of " the sunny 
 south," has pronounced Ulster the "black north," 
 and Scotland the "barren rock." 
 
 The Race. — Is the cause found in the natural char- 
 acter of the people ? Is the Irishman more sparingly 
 furnished than the Englishman, or the southern than 
 his -northern brother, with those qualities of mind 
 and heart which form the elements of a noble race 7 
 Such is the favorite theory of some. Because our 
 poor countryman has yielded to influences sufficient 
 to degrade the finest race, degradation has been all 
 but pronounced his normal state. Because he has 
 not been more than human, he has almost been con- 
 sidered less. His worst misfortune has been thus 
 converted into a fault, and he has been exposed to 
 general scorn for the very thing which composed his 
 strongest claim to general sympathy. The reproach 
 which should have been heaped on the authors of his 
 shame has been lavished on their injured victim, 
 until now his very name is a byeword ; you will hear 
 even the expression in Christian circles, " a blessed 
 land but a cursed people ;" and the words of one of 
 our finest sacred melodies have been uncharitably 
 applied to him — 
 
 " Where every prospect pleases, 
 And only man is vile." 
 
 The doctrine just amounts to this — that the blood 
 of the Saxon is naturally purer than that of the 
 
44 ALLEGED CAUSES. 
 
 Celt ; aiid its advocates consider it at once the most 
 just and charitable explanation of Ireland's wretch- 
 edness, that the Irish, as such, have some hereditary 
 blemish, which we may pity but can scarce hope to 
 cure. The shortest refutation of this doctrine would 
 be to trace the distribution of the two great families 
 of which the Celt and the Saxon are themselves but 
 branches — to appeal, for example, to Celtic France, 
 the second nation in Europe ; to show how much 
 England herself owes to the arms and arts of the 
 Celtic Normans ; and to prove, besides, the utter 
 impossibility of knowing, at this time of day, what 
 blood is Saxon and what is Celtic, in a race so mixed 
 as the British. 
 
 But we are content to meet our theorists on their 
 own ground ; and, assuming that the Irish are Celts, 
 and the English Saxons, we shall demonstrate the 
 falseness of their hypothesis. If they mean no more 
 than that the Irish as a nation have long been exposed 
 to influences which are found in the course of ages 
 to degrade a people, this is not to explain the mys- 
 tery of Ireland's woes, but only to remove it a little 
 .further ofF; in truth, it is virtually to give up their 
 theory, for this position none will deny ; and the 
 true question then is — What are these degrading in- 
 fluences ? But if they mean that there is in Irish 
 blood a deeper natural taint than what we all inherit 
 from our first progenitors, we pronounce the theory 
 false and absurd. The blue-eyed Saxon and the 
 black-eyed Celt are children of the same common 
 
THE PHYSICAL. 45 
 
 parent ; and the corruption which has flowed from 
 that original fountain, has been shared alike by all 
 its streams. The history of every race has proved 
 that none is 'naturally worse than another, but that 
 each in its turn has risen and suDk according to the 
 influences to which it has been exposed ; and to 
 charge the evils of Ireland on the Celt as a race, 
 proves not the guilt of the accused, but the ignorance 
 of the accuser. In the middle ages, when Saxon 
 lands were shrouded in darkness, Ireland, then most 
 purely Celtic, was the seat of learning for Europe ; 
 it is now when the least Celtic that she has grown 
 most wretched ; and this shifting on the social scale 
 would itself demonstrate, that her children's degra- 
 dation springs not from anything within them, but 
 something from ivithout. Again, the midland coun- 
 ties of Munster and Connaught contain a mixed 
 race of Saxon, Norman, and Danish blood : while 
 the pure aboriginal Celt is chiefly found in their 
 western regions, — yet the fact is notorious, that it is 
 these midland counties which are the chief scenes of 
 blood, and those western regions which have the best 
 excuse for poverty. Morever, on the Highlands of 
 Scotland and the mountains of Wales, we find two 
 other branches of the Celtic family ; and who hears 
 of their hills being drenched with the blood of mur- 
 der 1 Where can you find over all their wide moors 
 assassin-clubs nightly plotting crime, or ruffians 
 Swearing away innocent life for hire, or that general 
 conspiracy against law and justice, which has filled 
 
46 ALLEGED CAUSES. 
 
 Ireland with police and military ? No ; the British 
 Celts are 'as proverbial for peace as is their Irish 
 brother for disturbance. The most orderly sailor 
 who enters our ports is the Welshman, and our 
 Queen yearly seeks the Scottish Highlands as the 
 most quiet retreat in her kingdom. 
 
 You say that these British Celts are at least like 
 the Irish, poor and indolent 1 We ask how moun- 
 taineers can well be otherwise. Is it on the stormy 
 side of Snowdon or the Grampians you would look 
 for wealth or bustling enterprise ? — or is it such 
 dreary moorlands you would compare with one of 
 the finest islands of the sea 1 Why, it seems almost 
 as necessary that the British Celts should be poor 
 and slothful, as that the Irish should be wealthy and 
 diligent ; yet they have not a tithe of the sloth and 
 poverty we find in Ireland. The traveller can tes- 
 tify how cultivation is creeping up their bleakest 
 mountains, while with us the process is reversed, and 
 the wilderness is creeping down npon our finest vales. 
 And though in 1847 the potato failed with them as 
 with us, yet who heard of their hills covered with the 
 dead and dying — of millions granted them from the 
 treasury — of months spent with their case in parlia- 
 ment — or swarms of their beggars disturbing the 
 world 1 
 
 How, then, can race explain the difficulty, when 
 we find such difference in tribes of the same race 1 
 Yes, and strangest of all, in the same tribes at dif- 
 ferent periods. Time was when Wales and the 
 
THE PHYSICAL. 47 
 
 Highlands were the very home of blood and desola- 
 tion. The Welsh mountains have witnessed trage- 
 dies which still form the theme of many a thrilling 
 story : and those Scottish glens through which our 
 Sovereign wanders unattended by a soldier, once 
 rung with the clansmen's wildest yells. Now, surely 
 any natural degeneracy of the race would exhibit 
 much the same features at the same time in all its 
 tribes ; yet here we have two emerging from barbar- 
 ism to civilization in spite of vast disadvantages ; 
 and the third, from having once been the light of 
 Europe, fast sinking into ruin, despite all that can 
 be done to save it. 
 
 So much for this groundless assertion. We now 
 go farther, and boldly assert that the Irish, so 
 far from being naturally degraded, possess qualities 
 so admirable, that nothing but the foulest misman- 
 agement could have hindered them from becoming 
 one of the finest nations on the earth ; and we feel 
 the more at liberty to speak on this point, as none 
 but an Irishman can truly comprehend the odd con- 
 struction of the Irish mind. To most men it is a 
 puzzle — and to the British a national contrast. They 
 see before them a strange medley of faults and vir- 
 tues, of blunders and cleverness, of the comic and 
 the tragic ; and they are bewildered amidst the 
 nooks and corners of a mind so singular. Hence they 
 are unable to discern between his natural qualities 
 and his actual condition — between what he is and 
 what he might be made ; and because they see him 
 
48 ALLEGED CAUSES. 
 
 begging and stealing, and robbing and murdering, 
 they put him down as all but hopeless. Alas ! they 
 forget that in truth he has been " more sinned against 
 than sinning," and have confounded the man with 
 the malignant influences with which he is beset. 
 
 If you look even to his body — where will you find 
 a hardier % — able on dry potatoes to work down the 
 English laborer on his flesh meat and ale ; and one 
 cannot see his miserable diet without wondering 
 how nature can manufacture such bone and sinew 
 out of food so wretched ! Yes, and within that 
 robust frame dwells a spirit whose buoyant vivacity 
 years of sorrow have not destroyed — of which his 
 fun and frolics are but the irregular escapes, and 
 which one cannot but think was mercifully given 
 him to support him under woes which must have 
 crushed a more gloomy and contemplative spirit. 
 
 If you look to his mind, he is at least as much 
 celebrated for intelligence and wit, as for wildness 
 and rags. Expressions to him the most common- 
 place, you hear detailed as gems by the delighted 
 tourist ; nor can we think their simile very much 
 exaggerated who have compared his mind to the 
 fragments of the diamond sparkling in the bril- 
 liancy of unpolished lustre. And even as to those 
 more substantial qualities for which he usually gets 
 less credit, where has he ever been carefully trained 
 that he has not rewarded the cultivation % Shall 
 we appeal to the revolution wrought by Lord 
 George Hill in one of the most barbarous of our 
 
THE PHYSICAL. 49 
 
 mountain regions 1* or speak of the Connaught 
 children who come to our industrial schools abso- 
 lutely wild — needle and thimble being to them per- 
 fect mystery — and who in a few months become 
 new beings, and execute work so fine and delicate 
 as to have won a high place at the Great Exhibi- 
 tion. While as to more lofty pursuits of mind, 
 though our country cannot boast many stars in the 
 firmament of knowledge, she has at least shown 
 what her sons could do were their advantages equal 
 to those of others ; and has given to philosophy, a 
 Boyle — to literature, a Goldsmith — to eloquence, a 
 G rattan, and to poetry, a Moore — to the senate, the im- 
 mortal Burke, and to the field, the Hero of Waterloo. 
 Finally, if you look to our countrymen's heart, 
 what fine traits of character you will often see 
 bursting forth through all his degradation ! With- 
 in his rude bosom lies the germ of many a noble 
 quality which, if duly ripened, would make him a 
 fine specimen of human nature. Hospitable to a 
 proverb — generous to a fault — grateful, confiding, 
 warm-hearted, and enjoying a world-wide renown for 
 that reckless valor which seems scarce conscious of 
 danger ! Of this the peninsular war furnished 
 scores of romantic instances ; and the truth of 
 O'Connell's doggerel none can dispute — 
 
 " On the field of Waterloo, 
 Duke Wellington would have looked blue. 
 If Paddy hadn't been there too." 
 
 * " Facts from Gweedore," by Lord George Hill. 
 4 
 
50 ALLEGED CAUSES. 
 
 We have noticed those heart-rending proofs of 
 passionate tenderness which are daily furnished by 
 our departing emigrants ; and if any one is disposed 
 in cruel coldness to hint that such affectionate grief 
 is too strong to last, we appeal to the letters and 
 remittances they are continually sending home, not 
 to their parents and friends only, but often to their 
 neighbors, to enable them also to emigrate. It ap- 
 pears from official papers that near £'2,000.000 ster- 
 ling have in the last three years been remitted from 
 North America by these poor people. And a return 
 lately made by the Post-office shows, that one third 
 of all the letters coming weekly from America are 
 destined for Ireland. Follow those letters to their 
 destination i Imagine the sensation produced in 
 each humble abode when the anxiously-expected 
 epistle from some absent child arrives ! The vil- 
 lage neighbors flock in to hear it read ; and as some 
 one more learned than the rest reads aloud, mark the 
 tears, not only of the old couple, for that is nothing, 
 but of many a kind-hearted neighbor ! It is full of 
 inquiries after old acquaintances^ and tender allu- 
 sions to by-gone scenes, which, despite their occa- 
 sional tinge of the ludicrous, do vast credit to the 
 best feelings of our nature. In a word, the charac- 
 ter of the Irish is so richly dramatic, as to have 
 given rise to a distinct class of writers, such as 
 Edgeworth, Lover, and Carleton. The bleak winds 
 which beat on their half-naked forms may make 
 their bodies more callous, but they leave their feel- 
 
THE PHYSICAL. 51 
 
 ings as tender as ever ; and those sensibilities which 
 misfortune sometimes blunts in others, it often makes 
 morbidly acute in them. 
 
 Still we own they have many faults : we only as- 
 sert, and engage to prove, that these are the off- 
 spring of the unhappy circumstances in which they 
 are placed ; while we contend that many of them 
 confirm the position we are establishing, and are the 
 faults of a fine mind which has been poisoned or 
 neglected. How many of our countrymen owe their 
 present poverty to the very excess of their hospital- 
 ity ? How many, their turbulence, to that unsus- 
 pecting confidence in their advisers, which marks a 
 generous mind 1 How many of their worst quarrels, 
 to that warmth of temper which usually accompanies 
 warmth of heart ? And if. as is too justly alleged 
 against our countrymen, there is as much mercury 
 in his heels as there is wit in his head : if he is as 
 fond of handling the shillelagh as the spade ; it is 
 owing much to that impulsive ardor of character 
 which is as useful when well trained, as it is mis- 
 chievous when ill directed. Nor should we omit to 
 mention, that, being a sort of living hyperbole, he 
 has in very many respects earned a reputation much 
 worse than he deserves. When he is drunk, he 
 makes the whole town know it ; when provoked, he 
 bawls and gesticulates as though he were frantic, 
 and perhaps makes free with his neighbor's head ; 
 yet we who know him well assert, that in all this 
 " pother" there is not so much real, and far less en- 
 
52 ALLEGED CAUSES. 
 
 during wrath, than is often betrayed in another man's 
 scowl. 
 
 Here, then, we find the elements of a noble race 
 — a mind and heart of a structure as fine as it is 
 singular, resembling a complicated but delicate mu- 
 sical instrument which is easily destined by a 
 clumsy hand, but gives forth the finest tones when 
 swept by a skilful performer. We have here a char- 
 acter peculiarly capable of great good or great evil 
 — of the loftiest elevation or the lowest degradation 
 — which, like their own rich soil, can produce nothing 
 in common measure, but exhibits equal rankness in 
 the weeds that infest it, and richness in the flowers 
 that adorn it — a character, in short, which can be 
 turned to the best or the worst account, and has 
 been justly compared to fire, which when uncon- 
 trolled is the most destructive of elements, but skil- 
 fully managed, is the most useful, serving alike to 
 propel the engine and kindle the incense of the 
 altar ! 
 
 And thus we demonstrate that Ireland's miseries 
 can no more be traced to the race than to the coun- 
 try ; that, on the contrary, the natural superiority 
 of both proves that not only must the cause be 
 sought in some other quarter, but that it must truly 
 be one of dreadful malignity to have desolated so 
 fair a land, and degraded so fine a people. 
 
THE POLITICAL. 53 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 THE POLITICAL. 
 
 We now approach a subject which contains per- 
 haps the most popular solution of Ireland's wretch- 
 edness—the very eureka of multitudes. 
 
 For many years we have had two sets of rulers, 
 the one in St. Stephen's, and the other in Corn Ex- 
 change ; and we have had each charging the other 
 with our country's woes, in terms generally more 
 forcible than courteous. The grand text of the one 
 has been — " the curse of British misrule :" and a 
 favorite theme with the other — " the pest of Irish 
 agitation." And if what the one party rings in our 
 ears be true, the wrongs of Hungary are but trifles 
 to ours ; while if we are to listen to the other, such 
 swarms of demagogues must needs destroy the finest 
 land. Let us judge for a moment between parties 
 so fierce, and statements so conflicting. 
 
 The Agitator. — It is true, Ireland has for ages 
 been the hotbed of agitation. Inhabited since the 
 days of Elizabeth by two distinct races, having little 
 in common but the soil they tilled, regarding each 
 other as aliens in blood and religion, and their feel- 
 ings embittered by their relation as conquerors and 
 conquered — the result has been, that party strife 
 which has so long afflicted Ireland, and those swarms 
 
54 ALLEGED CAUSES. 
 
 of agitators that have so long infested it. Hence it 
 has been almost as much the scene of political con- 
 flict, as though this were the necessary condition of 
 its being — a something which floated in the atmos- 
 phere and grew on the soil. 
 
 But what if it is those who denounce this agita- 
 tion who are themselves in part to blame for its ex- 
 istence 1 Some real and more imaginary grievances 
 are the agitator's stock in trade ; and Britain has in 
 times past furnished so much of the former, as has 
 made him but too successful in palming off the latter. 
 Nay, even her mode of redressing grievances has 
 sometimes served his trade almost as much as her 
 obstinate continuance of them. Wise and timely 
 concession is death to the agitator ; but her conces- 
 sions have often been so tardy, and made with so bad 
 a grace, as rather to have increased his power. She 
 has too often led the Irish to think that she has 
 granted them more from motives of fear than from a 
 sense of justice. And when the agitator thus dis- 
 covered that little could be got without clamoring — 
 when he saw, or thought he saw, that turbulence 
 fared better than loyalty, that the quiet petitioner 
 was shoved aside, while the noisy blusterer obtained 
 a ready hearing — no wonder that he pushed his trade 
 and found it to flourish. 
 
 We must add our conviction that the evils of agi- 
 tation are much overrated. It is error, not truth, 
 which suffers most by it in the end. Even the 
 worst form of it can only thrive on popular ignorance ; 
 
THE POLITICAL. 55 
 
 yet it tends of necessity to dispel the ignorance on 
 which it thrives, and thus it sooner or later perishes 
 by its own hand. We appeal to the career of the 
 great Irish demagogue. Not only did he do much 
 to emancipate the Irish mind, and, by inspiring the 
 people with a love of civil liberty, awaken of neces- 
 sity some longing for its twin sister, religious free- 
 dom ; but it was his own teaching which mainly 
 enabled them, at length, to see through his schemes, 
 provoked that revolt which cost him his life, destroy- 
 ed Irish agitation as a trade, and sent him down to 
 the grave so little regretted, that you will now sel- 
 dom hear pronounced, even by those who once wor- 
 shipped him, the name of that prince of agitators, 
 who, from the rock of Darrynane, once governed the 
 empire. Irish agitation has thus committed suicide. 
 0' Conn ell is no more : and where is now his vast 
 train of followers ? Young Ireland, that killed him, 
 is also gone, having perished ignobly in a cabbage 
 garden. Conciliation Hall is closed ; Tara's Hill is 
 now as silent as Tara's Halls. Even the priests, 
 once omnipotent, already know that their new " De- 
 fence" agitation is doomed to be a failure. Our 
 quick-sighted countrymen have learned wisdom. 
 They have discovered their " Liberators" to be 
 greater tyrants than those from whom they proposed 
 to free them ; so they are bent on emigration, not on 
 agitation ; their thoughts are in the land of the 
 West. 
 
 Finally, agitation is sometimes a positive duty. 
 
56 ALLEGED CAUSES. 
 
 Constitutional agitation is the Briton's privilege, 
 and, where grievances exist, the country's blessing 
 and if, in designing hands, it has been the parent of 
 rebellion, it has, in upright hands, been the parent 
 of progress. To it we are indebted for every politi- 
 cal boon we have ever gained, from the triumph of 
 Runnymede to our latest reforms. Our glorious 
 Constitution itself is its child. And if Irish agita- 
 tion is an evil, it has sometimes, we fear, been a 
 necessary one. If at this moment, for instance, we 
 see agitation rise in Ulster — a province as proverbial 
 for peace as is the rest of Ireland for turbulence, — 
 if we see amongst its foremost leaders, not the des- 
 perate adventurer who has been schooled in the 
 club-room, but the quiet farmer who follows his 
 team — if we see this man doing violence to all his 
 tastes and habits, passing at once from the plough 
 to the platform, and there reciting his tale of suffer- 
 ings with an artlessness that proves its truth, and a 
 feeling which proclaims their intenseness — above all, 
 if we see him countenanced by those gospel ministers 
 to whose labors it is owing that Ulster is the Goshen 
 of Ireland, and amongst whose flocks those who 
 denounce them as " reverend agitators" can alone 
 sleep safely on their pillow — then must we own that 
 there is surely some good cause for a phenomenon 
 so singular ; and we must charge the attendant evils 
 of such agitation, not on those who seek redress, but 
 on those who refuse it. If their story is false, it is 
 easy to convict them of falsehood ; but if true, it is 
 
THE POLITICAL. 57 
 
 the foulest wrong to call them incendiaries — the 
 crudest mockery to bid them be still — the vilest 
 hypocrisy to denounce their strong language without 
 breathing a whisper against the oppression which 
 provokes it — and the basest insult to the gospel to 
 ask its ministers to make it the despot's tool by 
 preaching silent submission while the fruits of their 
 pastoral toils are being blasted, the only fair prov- 
 ince in Ireland is being desolated, and those who 
 are the very salt of our country are being driven to 
 other climes. 
 
 Having said this much on the general subject of 
 agitation, we still most freely admit that it must 
 have greatly injured the country ; but to say that it 
 has ruined it, is absurd. Agitation may produce 
 national discontent, but where has it ever caused na- 
 tional dissolution ? Besides it is those western re- 
 gions which have been the least agitated that are the 
 moet distressed, and those midland districts which 
 have suffered least, that have been the chief scenes 
 of excitement ; while it is well known, that years 
 ago, when political agitation was at its height, the 
 country was comparatively prosperous, and it is when 
 its fires are almost extinguished that we have reached 
 the lowest depths of misery. 
 
 Besides, agitation itself is not a primary evil, but 
 owes its existence to other evils. It either springs 
 from real grievances — and then not the agitator but 
 the legislature is chargeable with its evils — or from 
 imaginary grievances, and then they must be charged 
 
58 ALLEGED CAUSES. 
 
 on the guilt of the demagogue or the ignorance of 
 his dupes — causes which are moral, not political. 
 With wise and just rulers there can be few griev- 
 ances, and therefore little righteous agitation : with 
 an enlightened and virtuous people there can be few 
 dupes or deceivers, and hence little unrighteous agi- 
 tation. Therefore, granting it. as we do most freely, 
 to be one cause of our miseries, it is but a deriva- 
 tive one, and must itself be traced to some higher 
 cause. 
 
 The Legislature. — Is our country's blood, then, 
 on the hands of our rulers 1 Surely there must be 
 good ground for the everlasting cry of " Sassenach 
 oppression," which even our village children have 
 learned to repeat. It can scarce be possible that 
 the favorite theme of the Irish agitator, and the 
 most fruitful source of Irish discontent, should prove, 
 when examined, " like the baseless fabric of a vision." 
 Let us see. The " curse" alleged must be found 
 either in the constitution or the mode in which it is 
 administered. 
 
 Is it the constitution you object to 1 Then would 
 you have republicanism ? So have France and Mex- 
 ico ; and there you have edifying specimens of lib- 
 erty ! Or absolute monarchy ? So have Russia and 
 Austria ; and Africa contains not baser slavery than 
 is imposed on those countries by the " beardless 
 Nero," and the "northern bear." Or an ecclesiasti- 
 cal government? So has Rome ; and if you wish a 
 
THE POLITICAL. 59 
 
 sample of a government at once diabolical and das- 
 tardly, committing the vilest crimes in the name of 
 Jesus, read Nicolini's late History of the Pontificate 
 of Pio Nono. Or a mixed government, combining, 
 as far as possible, the benefits of the others without 
 their evils 1 Why, this is what you are blessed with, 
 if you only knew your blessings. Defects it has, 
 like everything human ; but these deserve not to be 
 named in comparison to its perfections. It is the 
 glory of England, the en\y of Europe, the admira- 
 tion of the world : and had Britain done no more for 
 Ireland than to displace her barbarous Brechon laws 
 with such a glorious code, that was a boon which 
 deserved her eternal gratitude ! 
 
 Is it, then, that Ireland is defrauded of the bless- 
 ings of this constitution, and is the victim of unjust 
 laws ? Doubtless, in the best statute book, there is 
 room for improvement, and, as we have hinted, we 
 could suggest amendments in our own. But what 
 true British subject can look this instant over Eu- 
 rope, and not feel thankful for his own immunities ? 
 While our countrymen have been roused to madness 
 by the demagogue's artful tale of British wrongs, 
 how carefully has he withheld the far longer list of 
 British benefits? Grant that, in former days, Eng- 
 land did not thoroughly act out the principles of lib- 
 erty, civil and religious ; — this was owing to the dark- 
 ness from which the world was then but emerging ; 
 and the blame rests not with her, but the authors of 
 this darkness. Grant that she imposed disabilities 
 
60 ALLEGED CAUSES. 
 
 on the Roman Catholics ; — if such acts of iniquity 
 as the gunpowder plot convinced her that they could 
 not be trusted with power, who but themselves were 
 to blame for the loss of it ? Or, granting that there 
 once was ground for the charge of British misrule, 
 on what do you rest your accusation now % Are we 
 insufficiently represented in Parliament ? We have 
 105 members, while Scotland has only 53. Is the 
 suffrage too limited ? For a long time, it embraced 
 even 40s. freeholders, and, as is now universally ad- 
 mitted, this proved not a blessing but a curse, and 
 led to that subdivision of land which has so greatly 
 enhanced our calamities. 
 
 Is it, then, the legislative union which has wrought 
 our country's ruin ? Such has been the language of 
 a thousand meetings, and the hottest bolts of " pa- 
 triot" indignation have been launched against the 
 very name of " that traitor, Castlereagh ;" while 
 repeal has been proclaimed the measure which would 
 usher in the millennium of Ireland. Well, union is 
 usually strength, not weakness. Scotland has felt 
 the full force of the proverb since her parliament 
 was transferred from Holy rood to Westminster : 
 and how can the same measure prove Scotland's 
 prosperity and Ireland's destruction ? Besides, other 
 stubborn facts interfere most rudely with our patri- 
 ots' assertions ; for it appears from the records of 
 the Irish House of Commons, that trade had so 
 grievously declined before the union, that College 
 Green was beset with complaints on the subject ; 
 
THE POLITICAL. 61 
 
 t 
 
 while, according to returns from time to time ordered 
 by the Imperial Parliament, our imports and exports 
 have, since the union, greatly increased. Now if, as 
 we are told, the southern provinces have declined 
 since the union, of course this increase must have 
 been chiefly confined to Ulster ; and then comes the 
 problem, how the union can be such a blessing to one 
 province, and such a curse to the rest, especially 
 when, instead of being the most favored by govern- 
 ment, Ulster has been notoriously the most neglected 
 of the four ? In truth, a parliament in which so few 
 were found proof against the "bribes" of Castlereagh, 
 was, at best, but a doubtful blessing ; nor, were all 
 the ancient glories of College Green to be restored, 
 uld we expect an assembly of much purer patriots, 
 we are to judge by the specimens that often grace 
 our hustings, and offer our country their senatorial 
 services. 
 
 Again, we are told of the heartless treatment which 
 Ireland receives at the hands of Britain. Nay, so 
 far have base men reckoned on our people's ignorance, 
 that they have assured them no country groans be- 
 neath such a load of taxation ! Why, the taxes of 
 Great Britain are, at least, thrice as numerous, com- 
 prising a long list, unknown in Ireland, of taxes on 
 carriages, gigs, horses, dogs, servants, coachmen, her- 
 aldry, income, plate, &c. ; and our only heavy imposts 
 are our poor-rates, county-cess, and tithe-rent charge, 
 all of which are expended among ourselves, and the 
 severity of two of which is owing to our own poverty 
 
62 ALLEGED CAUSES. 
 
 and crime. And as to oppressive laws, we ask on 
 what page of our statute book are they contained ? 
 Or, where, alas ! can you find amoDgst us those fea- 
 tures of down-trodden greatness which oppression 
 never fails to bring out, and which have made the 
 Pole and Hungarian the adntiration of the world? 
 Is it such wretches as throng our jails, who consti- 
 tute the victims of British oppression ? — or such 
 deeds as larceny and felony that compose our claims 
 to the sympathy of nations ? Misrule ! such was 
 the impression the attempted rebellion of 1848 made 
 even on its own leaders, that they were heard to 
 confess that their countrymen " did not deserve to 
 be free." 
 
 The truth is, Ireland has been the object of the 
 most pains-taking legislation ; and whatever have 
 been the sins of our rulers, it would be downright 
 wrong to deny this. More time is each session 
 spent on Irish affairs, than on all our colonial affairs 
 together ; and more of the public treasure has been 
 lavished on Ireland than any other portion of the 
 empire. Since 1800, 33 Committees of Parliament, 
 and 21 Government Commissions have been appoint- 
 ed to inquire into the causes of our miseries, and the 
 best means of their removal ; and during the same 
 period we have received £26,000,000 sterling in mere 
 grants and advances.* £1,000,000 has been given 
 to construct harbors for our commerce ; £8,500,000 
 to encourage our manufactures ; £8,000,000 to save 
 
 * Thorn's Statistics, passhii. 
 
THE POLITICAL. 63 
 
 our people from the grave of famine ; while our 
 canals, railways, agriculture, and fisheries have all 
 been nursed at the public expense. Nay, even our 
 charitable institutions are largely supported by par- 
 liamentary grants.* Yet, while not a tithe of this 
 kindness has been shown either to Ulster or Scot- 
 land, the southern demagogue has for years harped 
 upon British neglect. 
 
 Where, then, can you find such political griev- 
 ances as can at all account for our miseries ; or how 
 explain that our least favored province is the most 
 prosperous, and its people the most loyal, though at 
 least as able to detect, and ready to resist oppression 
 as any of their countrymen ? Does it not demon- 
 strate how little our disease is connected with poli- 
 tics at all, that we have for years been growing 
 worse, while our legislation has confessedly been 
 growing better ; until now, the country is at the 
 point of dissolution, when according to our political 
 empirics she should at least have been convalescent ? 
 Alas ! if legislation could have blessed us, we should 
 now have been the happiest of nations, for on no 
 country's behalf have more statutes been framed — 
 and our people are at length beginning to perceive 
 this. They have seen how their ' : patriots" have all 
 been strangely hushed in the hour of our deepest 
 distress, when, if British misrule is its cause, their 
 voice should have been louder than ever. And they 
 are beginning to see that other motives may influence 
 
 * Thorn's Statistics, 1852, p. 251. 
 
64 ALLEGED CAUSES. 
 
 an agitator besides those of pure-minded patriotism ; 
 that, after all, parliament can do little for a country 
 if it will do nothing for itself; and that in order to 
 prosperity, Ireland needs something far different 
 from what agitation can extort, or legislation con- 
 cede. Hence they are beginning to suspect that 
 the grand cause of their evils is something in them- 
 selves rather than in the laws — something which 
 follows the Irishman beyond his native shores, and 
 makes him the same wretched being in every town 
 in Britain ; beyond the United Kingdom, and makes 
 him the same byeword by the lakes of Canada, and 
 on the plains of Australia ; aye, beyond the u curse 
 of British misrule" altogether, and makes the south- 
 ern the chief inmate of American jails, while many 
 a northern has reached the first rank amongst her 
 citizens ! 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 THE SOCIAL. 
 
 Thus, the mystery of Ireland's woes seems but to 
 deepen' as we proceed. We have sought its solution 
 in her physical state, but it is not there. We have 
 examined her political state, neither is it there. Per- 
 haps we shall be more successful in our present de- 
 partment of inquiry. 
 
 We cannot give the reader a better key to Ire- 
 
THE SOCIAL. 65 
 
 laud's social state, than to say that the clouds of 
 feudalism still linger on her hills. Why they so 
 linger after having gone up so generally oif the face 
 of Britain, shall hereafter be considered ; it is enough 
 now to state the fact. You not only see it in the 
 extreme paucity of a middle class, that index of a 
 country's progress : but you can still trace the old 
 division into barons and serfs only too distinctly in 
 the modern one of gentry and peasantry ; and you 
 have, of course in a milder form, the same haughty 
 assumption in the one class, and the same servile 
 submission in the other. This remark will prepare 
 the reader for the following brief glance at Ireland's 
 social state, under the simple classification of habits 
 and 'pursuits. 
 
 Habits. — There is little which more distinguishes 
 the upper classes of Ireland from those of Britain 
 than extravagant habits, combined with foolish no- 
 tions of rank and style. Inquire into the history of 
 those decayed families which now fill the land, and 
 you will find, that with many honorable exceptions, 
 doubtless, they have for generations lived in a man- 
 ner unsuiteel to their station, and incompatible with 
 their means. Even so late as 60 years ago, high 
 life in Ireland was little else than a round of fash- 
 ionable dissipation ; and the wildest escapades to be 
 found in the works of Barrington and Lever, were, 
 if not literally, at least in substance perpetrated. A 
 host considered it discreditable if any of his guests 
 
66 ALLEGED CAUSES. 
 
 were allowed to leave his table without needing 
 help ; and so deliberately did the guests themselves 
 prepare for their fate, that they often wound up 
 their watches before sitting down to dinner ! As 
 for fighting, Sir Lucius 0' Trigger was the common- 
 est character. No gentleman travelled without 
 duelling pistols. His " marking irons," as they 
 were called, were as indispensable an article as his 
 razors ; and doubtless sufficient ground was given 
 for the squib which represented the morning orders 
 at an hotel sometimes to be, " Pistols for two, and 
 breakfast for one /" What, then, shall we say of 
 other vices ? It was the frequent boast of not a few 
 of these gentlemen, how many females they had de- 
 stroyed ; and such moral nuisances were many of 
 them, that absenteeism itself became a blessing, and 
 the most important service they ever rendered their 
 country was to die. 
 
 Alas ! these habits have not all died with them. 
 The improved tone of society at large forbids, of 
 course, the same reckless wildness ; but so far at 
 least, as extravagant style is concerned, too many of 
 our present gentry walk in the ways of their fathers. 
 With many highly honorable exceptions, the same 
 passion for display which has already beggared them, 
 continues, though the means of indulging it has fail- 
 ed. Numbers are at this moment living at the ex- 
 pense of others, when no longer able to live at their 
 own. And to judge by their conduct, one would 
 think that they considered it the deepest dishonor 
 
r~*s 
 
 THE SOCIAL. 67 
 
 for a gentleman to stoop to any kind of industry ; 
 more disgraceful to be a shopkeeper, than to be hope- 
 lessly indebted to one ; and scarce so humiliating to 
 borrow one's bread, as to earn it in some honest call- 
 ing ; while nothing is to them more incomprehensible 
 than that English members of parliament should 
 sometimes be proprietors of a warehouse ! 
 
 Habits travel downwards ; and those of the upper 
 ranks have been aped by our scanty middle class. 
 Men often retire from business and set up as " gentle- 
 men," with less means than Englishmen generally 
 commence on ; and you will meet dozens in every 
 southern town, driving about in total idleness, on " for- 
 tunes" which English farmers would scarce deem a 
 competency. The same passion for style marks their 
 very nomenclature ; — a small trader is a merchant, 
 and a shop a store ; a plain cottage is a villa, and a 
 common street a mall. Nor is it less observable 
 in their domestic arrangements. Convenience usually 
 yields to show ; — if the drawing-room is well kept, it 
 is not so much matter about the kitchen ; and the 
 back premises often sadly contrast with the lawn. 
 The young gentlemen's ambition is to have a dog or 
 a horse. The young ladies sit in the drawing-room 
 and play the piano ; and if one drop of blood of any 
 ancient family can be traced in their veins, then, no 
 matter how penniless they may be, the thriving " up- 
 start" who aspires to their hand often meets a re- 
 sponse more prompt than agreeable. 
 
 What, then, shall we say of our peasantry 1 You 
 
68 ALLEGED CAUSES. 
 
 need only enter one of those innumerable cabins 
 which disfigure the face of our country, to get a 
 glimpse of their condition. You enter and find some- 
 times two, but oftener one apartment ; and there the 
 pig and the family dwell harmoniously together. 
 You look around and find a group of half-naked 
 urchins, whose legs are encrusted with mire. You 
 ask for the poor man's wardrobe — it is all on his 
 back ; and a sad specimen it usually is of " looped 
 and windowed raggedness." You cannot help won- 
 dering how, when once out of his clothes, he can ever 
 get into them again, or perhaps your wonder rather 
 is how this can be a difficulty, there being so many 
 entrances. Finally, you ask his history, and find 
 that, from whatever cause, his entire class has for 
 ages stood still on the borders of civilization ; and 
 that whole districts continue in a state of primitive 
 barbarism, not much exceeded by the American In- 
 dians. You traverse, for instance, the entire west 
 coast, from Donegal to Cork, an extent of 300 miles, 
 and stretching the whole length of Ireland ; and can 
 scarce discover one sign of that upward tendency 
 which distinguishes the man from the beast ; but 
 the same unchanging style of hut and habits con- 
 tinues through generations, as though their only 
 guide really were the instinct of the lower creation. 
 
 Pursuits. — We have seen the sickly state of our 
 husbandry, commerce, and manufacture, despite the 
 rarest facilities — that perhaps in no country has na- 
 
THE SOCTAL. 69 
 
 ture done more, and art done less. Alas ! every ef- 
 fect has its adequate cause. Let any one brought 
 up in an English town, accustomed to its matchless 
 habit of business, and the clock-work regularity of 
 its establishments, pay a visit to any of our southern 
 towns, and in what a different atmosphere he instantly 
 finds himself ! How forcibly he is struck with the 
 air of idleness that pervades its streets ; he is not 
 less struck with the unbusiness-like appearance, and 
 often positive slovenliness of its shops and offices. 
 And. save where some Scotch house has chased it 
 away, he finds much the same style of business, with 
 all its attributes — its high prices, and second prices, 
 and indifferent assortments — which prevailed in those 
 v - good old times," when the affairs of life jogged 
 quietly on ; when the goddess of pleasure shared the 
 throne with the god of riches ; and when the evening 
 was the best part of the day. Nor let him be sur- 
 prised to see the proprietor taking his drive during 
 business hours, or hear of his going a-sporting once 
 a-week or so. Least of all, let him wonder when he 
 examines his ledgers, to find them fall short of his 
 English notions of accuracy. And to all this let 
 him add such a moral tone in society, that it is 
 nothing rare for a clerk to abscond, or an employer 
 more than once to fail, or even plain cheating itself 
 to occur — and then let him say if our commercial 
 decline is any great mystery. 
 
 Should any one pronounce this picture overdrawn, 
 we assert that it is rather the reverse. Is it not no- 
 
70 ALLEGED CAUSES. 
 
 torious, that all over the south and west — (for we 
 speak not of Ulster ; its social state, we shall pres- 
 ently bee, '> as different from the rest of Ireland as 
 its temporal) — our best houses, in most departments 
 of trade, are Scotch and English ; that, even now, 
 they are flourishing when our own countrymen in the 
 same business are melting away ; and that it is to 
 them we are mainly indebted for the little commer- 
 cial character we possess? It is they who have 
 compelled our own people to adopt their improved 
 mode of business, and created a trade where none 
 previously Existed. To them we are largely in- 
 debted for a fish and pork trade ; and there was not 
 in the entire pasture county of Kerry a single but- 
 ter market, till one was, some years ago, established 
 by a Scotchman ! Even our Irish employers them- 
 selves find it often necessary to employ Scotch or 
 English servants. Are not our railways generally 
 constructed, our fisheries conducted, our banks offi- 
 cered, nay, even our posts of gardener and land- 
 steward, filled by strangers ? Was there ever such 
 folly as to blame all this on England, as some are 
 so fond of doing? The tides of business obey the 
 same laws with those of the ocean ; and if we our- 
 selves were what we ought to be. the whole power 
 of England could not produce this state of things. 
 Nothing, in fact, can make inferior articles long keep 
 the market against superior ones. Natural laws are 
 too strong for artificial restrictions ; and if there is 
 any conspiracy against us, it is not an English, but 
 
THE SOCIAL. 71 
 
 a world-wide conspiracy. The Dutchman undersells 
 us in the Loudon markets : the American undersells 
 us in our own. Our hottest repealers themselves 
 traverse England for goods which they might often 
 get at home; and too well they know why — that, 
 however humbling the truth, poor Ireland has drop- 
 ped far behind in the world's commercial march. 
 
 But the chief interest in Ireland, is the agrtctd- 
 til rat ' ; yet, though no people are more dependent 
 on the farm, with none is the style of farming worse. 
 No man seems to trust more to the mere vis natures 
 than our peasant farmer. Subsoil ploughing he 
 scarce ever heard of, and draining was rare until the 
 late drainage bill was passed — he usually leaves the 
 water to go as it came. His ploughing is bad, his 
 fencing worse, and his spade, called a toy, seems as 
 if made on purpose to disturb the ground as little as 
 possible. His crop is usually left to struggle on as 
 best it can against an army of weeds ; and as if it 
 were sacrilege so far to interfere with Nature's wild- 
 est productions as to cut them down, you will see 
 thistles standing on the harvest ridge, the crops hav- 
 ing been carefully cut away around them, and in 
 windy Autumn's days, you will meet their winged 
 seeds careering along the fields. As you go west- 
 ward, tilings grow worse. In Mayo, you will see 
 the limestone in the river beds, and the turf on their 
 banks to burn it withal ; yet it lies undisturbed, as 
 though its use were unknown ; and even so late as 
 1847, when Mr. Brannigan introduced turnips to 
 
72 ALLEGED CAUSES. 
 
 Ballinglen, so new were the}* to the peasantry, that 
 they went by the name of " Brannigan's turnips." 
 
 You inquire the cause of such agricultural delin- 
 quency, and find that, as usual in Ireland, all men 
 blame all men but themselves. The tenant declares 
 that the rent is too high, and the landlord replies by 
 threatening to raise it : the one protests that his 
 landlord is a tyrant, and the other that his tenantry 
 arc sluggards : and each adduces so much in proof 
 of his charge, that one is half inclined to believe 
 them both. At all events, the truth seems to lie be- 
 tween them. We cannot believe the tenant to be 
 the innocent martyr he represents himself, or that 
 high rents are the sole cause of his wretchedness, 
 else how is it that those tenants whose land is Is. an 
 acre, are usually as poor as those who pay 20s. % 
 Indeed, it is quite a common remark, that this class 
 never thrive until their rent is raised : and should 
 we charge on the landlords all the poverty, even of 
 those who pay the highest rents, their own broken 
 fences and weed-grown fields would testify against 
 us. 
 
 Still, we believe that the tenant's wretchedness is 
 mainly chargeable on the landlord, or. rather, the 
 wretched system of landlordism in Ireland, and that. 
 of all the secondary and derivative causes of our 
 miseries, this is the chief. The gentry being the 
 monopolists of the soil, have always been able to let 
 it to the peasantry on whatever terms they pleased ; 
 and the latter, having no other means of livelihood, 
 
THE SOCIAL. 73 
 
 have had no alternative but to accept their terms or 
 starve. Such entire control presented temptations 
 too strong for slender virtue. Such irresponsible 
 power naturally led to tyranny ; such complete mo- 
 nopoly to exorbitant rents ; such easily acquired 
 wealth, to extravagant living ; and all together, to 
 many of those evils in which both landlord and ten- 
 ant arc now hopelessly involved. Forgetting that 
 property has its duties as well as its rights, many 
 landlords lived as though they were born but to en- 
 joy, fruges wnsumere nati, and, instead of seeking 
 the elevation of their tenants, treated them as mere 
 ministers of their pleasures, and supporters of their 
 extravagance. 
 
 This conduct sowed the seeds of manifold evils ; 
 the events of the last thirty years have fearfully ac- 
 celerated their growth ; at length the terrible harvest 
 has come, and landlordism now reaps as it sowed. 
 Fifty years ago, the extravagance of our gentry was 
 at its height, and their estates were becoming rapid- 
 ly embarrassed. At the same period, the wars of 
 Napoleon had raised farm produce to an artificial 
 price. The opportunity was too tempting, and the 
 landlord generally raised the rent in proportion. 
 While the wars lasted, *■ times were good ;" the farm- 
 er could pay, and the landlord lived accordingly: 
 but ever since the peace of 1815, farm produce has 
 been sinking in value, till now it is not one half its 
 old war price : yet land has still continued at the 
 old war rent, and in many cases risen far above it ; — 
 
74 ALLEGED CAUSES. 
 
 that is, the farmer has as much, or more, rent to pay 
 with but one half the means of paying it ; and the 
 result has, of course, been his rapid decline. In 
 vain were the landlords entreated, for their own 
 sakes, to lower the rents in time ; in vain were they 
 assured that they were '" killing the goose which laid 
 the golden egg:" in vain were they reminded that 
 they were driving to America the very flower of 
 their tenantry, and filling their places with a de- 
 graded class, many of whom would promise any rent 
 and pay none. It was utterly vain. They had not 
 the sense to foresee the future consequences, nor the 
 firmness to withstand the present temptation, and so, 
 allured by " a high bid," they drove off their substan- 
 tial farmers to make way for a pauper tenantry ; and 
 now the day of reckoning has arrived. 
 
 These evils have been aggravated by various cir- 
 cumstances. One has been our system of ^middle- 
 men" — that ' : squireen" class, who, holding under the 
 head landlord, sublet their property at rack-rents, 
 and, instead of earning their bread with the sweat 
 of their own brow, lived in idleness on the sweat of 
 a down-trodden tenantry. Another, has been the 
 oppressive exactions of unprincipled agents, with 
 their grim train of bailiffs and drivers. Even so 
 late as 1845, the " Tines Commissioner" brought 
 to light a system of iniquity, on the part of both 
 middlemen and agents, which was scarcely credible, 
 it has often been remarked, that whoever is poor, 
 agents generally get rich ; and could the " office" 
 
THE SOCIAL. 75 
 
 walls speak, the mystery would perhaps disappear ; 
 while, to say nothing of such oblations as eggs and 
 butter, geese and turkeys, many arc the more costly 
 offerings with which a trembling tenantry are obliged 
 to propitiate a middleman's favor. 
 
 But the crowning hardship is the tenant's liability 
 to have the fruits of his improvements grasped by 
 his landlord. If a peasant rents a common for 5s. 
 an acre. and. by his own sole exertion, makes it in a 
 few years worth 20.v . the landlord not unfrequently 
 raises the rent to 20s.. and gives him his option to 
 pay it or "quit." The present Tenant-Eight agita- 
 tion in Ulster owes its existence to these unrighteous 
 exactions. The Ulster farmers are by far the most 
 improving in Ireland. They found Ulster a desert : 
 they have made it a garden. : - Tenant-Eight" simply 
 means the tenant's right to the benefit of his oivn 
 improvements. Besides its obvious justice, it was 
 secured to them at the time of the " Plantation," 
 and has ever since been the prevailing usage in 
 Ulster. But the farmers have of late got some 
 cause to think that the sooner it is made hnv the 
 better ; and nothing but the most short-sighted policy 
 would resist a claim so righteous. That landlord 
 must be blind who does not see that, if he would 
 have his estates improved, it is by rewarding, not 
 punishing the tenant for his industry. No man in 
 his senses will make improvements in the prospect 
 of being robbed of them, or taxed for them ; and if 
 this is the reward the Ulster landlords will confer 
 
76 ALLEGED CAUSES. 
 
 upon tenantry who have made their position such an 
 enviable contrast to that of Ireland's other landlords, 
 let them rest assured that the same ruin awaits them 
 which has now fallen upon these their brethren. In 
 truth, it is manifest thai no concession of mere 
 tenant-right can now save them. A series of social 
 changes has so altered our entire condition, that the 
 relations of landlord and tenant must be completely 
 readjusted to meet these altered circumstances. To 
 resist such a measure seems to us like contending 
 against fate, and, we fear, the longer it is deferred 
 it will be the more sweeping when it comes. 
 
 Such, then, is a brief sketch of Ireland's social 
 state. Well, the complicated cause of our wretched- 
 ness begins at length to unfold itself; for what else 
 but social decay could flow from such social derange- 
 ment ? It surely requires no great sagacity to per- 
 ceive that such habits must lead to want, and want 
 to general disorganization, or that that country must 
 decline, in which all classes, from the landlord to 
 the peasant, so generally neglect the duties of their 
 station ? A country which wears such an air of 
 idleness, that the Englishman, on first landing from 
 Iiis own busy home, almost fancies he has arrived on 
 some holiday ; whose style of business and farming 
 is so bad, that he protests it would entail certain 
 bankruptcy in Britain, and where the advent of a 
 Scotchman is deemed a blessing to a neighborhood, 
 and he makes a fortune on the spot where his prede- 
 cessor starved. Nor can we have better proof of 
 
THE MORAL. J J 
 
 our position than the social superiority of Ulster. 
 We have already seeu its comparative prosperity ■ 
 well, the least observant traveller who visits this 
 province is struck with the diligence of the husband- 
 man, the enterprise of the merchant, and the peace- 
 ful, plodding industry of all. There, all is frugality 
 and simplicity — mothers, even of the first rank, 
 attend closely to their households, instead of driv- 
 ing about in their carriages. There, idleness and 
 style, instead of being deemed respectable, are 
 despised ; there, men take rank, not so much from 
 what their fathers were, as from what they them- 
 selves are ; and instead of the high-born profligate 
 being respected, and the architect of his own fortune 
 despised, there is practised the noble sentiment of the 
 Roman, who, when taunted by a profligate patrician 
 with his obscure birth, replied,-" You owe all your 
 greatness to others, I owe mine to myself." 
 
 But it is evident that Ireland's social state must 
 itself be derivative ; and, while one cause of our evils, 
 must flow from higher causes. What can these be 1 
 is our next subject of inquiry. 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 THE MORAL. 
 
 Let us here premise, that knowledge and virtue, 
 aud ignorance and vice, are the chief causes of social 
 
78 ALLEGED CAUSES. 
 
 elevation and degradation respectively. Enough of 
 the former must raise any nation to the highest pin- 
 nacle of greatness ; while enough of the latter must 
 sink it to the lowest depths. What makes the chief 
 difference between the savage and the sage but 
 knowledge, or between the angel and the demon but 
 virtue ? The nation which has most of both must 
 necessarily leave others behind. Scarce anything 
 could keep down a people all light and virtue, and 
 nothing could elevate a people all ignorance and vice. 
 And this is so obvious, that let a wilderness be filled 
 with the world's best benefactors, and it would soon 
 become a paradise ; then let these be succeeded by 
 the worst malefactors, and it would quickly become 
 a wilderness more terrible than at first ; or let it be 
 filled with succeeding generations, varying in their 
 degrees of light and virtue, and all other things 
 being equal, its condition would vary in exact pro- 
 portion. How seldom does virtue find its way, even 
 by mistake into a jail ! And so rarely is knowledge 
 itself found there, that for the four years ending 
 1850, the average annual proportion of prisoners in 
 Ireland who could read and write, was not 18 per 
 cent.* Let us see how far Ireland enjoys these 
 blessings : — 
 
 Knowledge. — According to the census of 1841, 
 
 * Thorn (1852) p. 201. It is this intimate connection of 
 ignorance and vice which has induced us to class both un- 
 der the one head of moral causes. Their powerful mutual 
 influence will become more apparent as we proceed. 
 
THE MORAL. 79 
 
 near 53 per cent, of the population of Ireland could 
 neitJier read nor write ; while only 26 per cent, 
 could both read and write ! Thus our educational 
 statistics, at the very first glance, bring out the 
 astounding fact, that 1 1 years ago three fourths of 
 the people were devoid of the simplest rudiments of 
 knowledge. You ask how can this be accounted for. 
 Till the National Board was established, whole dis- 
 tricts depended for their education on the Irish 
 Hedge School — that matchless nursery of knowl- 
 edge, whose site was a bog, whose forms were often 
 the floor, whose slates and copy-books were some- 
 times the chalked walls and door, and whose school- 
 books such select works as the " Irish Rapparees," 
 and " Freny, the Robber ;" while all was presided 
 over by a pedagogue, compared to whom, Gold- 
 smith's schoolmaster himself was a trifle.* What, 
 then, was our learning when such was its seat % Even 
 yet the National Board has a stupendous task be- 
 fore it. There are still whole districts into which 
 scarce a book or a newspaper penetrates, and where 
 you will find professional scribes who are employed 
 by the people to write their letters for them to 
 America. 
 
 We have already noticed the barbarism of our 
 western coast. The numerous islands in particular, 
 which so beautifully stud the bosom of the Atlantic, 
 and seem designed, like smaller gems, to garnish the 
 " emerald, set in the ring of the sea," are sunk in 
 
 * Report, Commissioners, Public Instruction, 1834. 
 
80 ALLEGED CAUSES. 
 
 such primitive ignorance, that when, some years 
 ago, a boat from Tory island was driven by a 
 storm on the mainland, the crew pulled leaves and 
 branches off the trees to show as curiosities on their 
 return !* 
 
 Their moral and religious ignorance is still more 
 deplorable. It is quite notorious that thousands in 
 Ireland never saw a Bible ; never heard of the 
 Trinity ; know nothing of the Saviour but the 
 name ; and are so ignorant of the nature of vice 
 and crime, as to be restrained from it chiefly through 
 fear of the prison. To the question. " Who made 
 you?" how often have our missionaries received the 
 answer, " It was my mother, sir !" To the question, 
 " Are you a sinner ?" you will often get the reply, 
 " No, indeed, sir !" We ourselves have often asked, 
 " How many persons are there in the Godhead ?" and 
 have been answered, " I do not know, sir ;" and in 
 reply to the question, " Who is the Holy Ghost ?" 
 have been told by several that they never heard of 
 a Holy Ghost ! And should you express surprise 
 at any of these answers, you are often silenced by 
 the touching reply, " God help me, I never got the 
 learning." God help them, indeed ! and these are 
 not savage heathens in the jungle, but our own 
 Christian fellow-countrymen — of whom, even while 
 we write, some are passing before the judgment 
 throne ! 
 
 Hence their amazing superstition. You will see 
 * Noel's Tour. 
 
THE MORAL. 
 
 charms called " gospels," and " scapulars'' tied round 
 their necks, and fixed in their cabin roofs to keep 
 away devils and fairies ! If their cow takes ill, it is 
 " fairy shot ;" if their churn will not yield the but- 
 ter, it is Ci blinked ;" indeed, they seem as if they 
 thought evil spirits had a peculiar fancy for a dairy, 
 and had little else to clo than play pranks with the 
 milk and butter. Their superstitious minds have 
 covered the land with holy wells, trees, lakes, and 
 mountains, each having its patron saint — rivalling 
 the ancient Greeks in their poetic creations of naiads, 
 nereids, fauns, and hamadryads. You will some- 
 times see them, as they pass a holy well, take off 
 their hats and begin to mutter as if addressing some 
 spirit who resided in its waters. Most of these 
 wells are endowed with miraculous powers, and are 
 therefore frequented by many. Some cure the 
 lame, and some the blind ; others seem not particu- 
 lar, but extend equal relief to all diseases. And 
 one well in Err is, most unworthy of its country, is 
 so ungallant as to have an utter aversion to the 
 entire female sex !* 
 
 If next we turn to that fourth part who can read 
 and write, while very many are most highly educated, 
 the attainments of the majority are, we fear, but 
 slender. In 6 counties, and 74 towns, with popula- 
 tions ranging from 2,500 to 12,400 each, there was 
 not in 1849 a single book-shop; and in the entire 
 island there was. in proportion to the population, 
 
 * Gregg's Visit to Erris. 
 6 
 
82 ALLEGED CAUSES 
 
 only one for every 9 which then existed in Scot- 
 land !* While, as to private libraries, it is said that 
 in the greater part of Connaught, there do not exist 
 as many books as would stock a book-shop in a small 
 English town.f And we fear that even these w 
 not be found of the most select kind — and that the 
 library, so composed, would be one rather of enter- 
 taining than useful knowledge. Indeed, so low is 
 our thirst for learning, that, except in a few towns, 
 the trade of bookseller is bad : that of publisher 
 worse ; and that of author worst of all. The latter 
 have almost always to look, and usually repair to 
 England for a livelihood. We have not more than 
 two or three magazines wdiich deserve the name ; 
 and the majority of at least our western newspapers, 
 while generally dearer than the London Times, are 
 sorry samples of a country's literature. In truth, 
 the cacoetJies scribendi has never been a failing of the 
 Irish. Nor can we say much more for the suetudo 
 legendi. Our people are fonder of the newsroom 
 than the library ; and when they are found amongst 
 the corridors of the latter, poetry too often carries 
 it against philosophy — fiction against fact ; and even 
 Brown and Newton have generally to yield to the 
 rival claims of Scott and Dickens. 
 
 In a word, if you make the experiment, you will 
 find that even our best classes are as far behind the 
 Scotch in substantial attainments, as they are before 
 them in polite accomplishments. Hearken to the 
 
 * Colportage ia Ireland, pp. 9, 10. f Ibid. 
 
THE MORAL. 83 
 
 conversation in Scotch and Irish steamers, and you 
 will often find the Scotch farmer to possess more 
 solid information than the Irish landlord. On re- 
 ligious subjects especially, the Irish gentleman would 
 find himself but a sorry match for many a shepherd 
 on the Lammermuirs. Indeed, such is the thirst for 
 learning in Scotland, that not only do youths who 
 are destined for the merchant's desk usually attend 
 the university, but we have known common trades- 
 men to work in their shops one half of the day, and 
 attend the college classes the remainder. And 
 though Ave cannot speak so favorably of the general 
 attainments of the English, they have ever been re- 
 markably distinguished above the Irish for the im- 
 portant quality of being thoroughly acquainted, each 
 with his own business, no matter how little they may 
 know beyond it. 
 
 Now, if thus it appears that the minds of the Irish 
 are left for the most part as waste as their moun- 
 tains, we ask, what must be the effect ? Never was 
 " knowledge power" so much as now. Education has, 
 in fact, become the grand road to advancement ; na- 
 tional greatness can now be attained no longer by 
 arms, but by arts and sciences ; and in the clear 
 conviction of this, other nations are pushing on with 
 nil their might in the march of enlightenment. 
 Who, then, can wonder if Ireland stationary, has 
 been left by the world jwogressive ; if ignorance, only 
 matched in the dark ages, should have no chance in 
 an age of pre-eminent light ; and if the vast superi- 
 
84 ALLEGED CAUSES. 
 
 ority of other countries in the whole field of industry, 
 from the highest manufacture to the humblest trade, 
 should have driven us out of even our own market ? 
 Surely the blindest can scarce help perceiving that 
 nothing short of a standing miracle could have hin- 
 dered the tides of prosperity from leaving such a laud, 
 and flowing to other shores. 
 
 Virtue. — Again, the amount of virtue amongst 
 us the reader himself can estimate by the following 
 facts and statistics. The number of troops stationed 
 in Ireland now for many years is surprising: — the 
 annual average of the last 8 years has been upwards 
 of 25,000 men ! Thus, to control 7,000.000 of pro- 
 fessing Christians, it requires near one fourth of that 
 magnificent army, which is found sufficient (our na- 
 tive Indian troops excepted) to control the greatest 
 empire on which the sun ever shone ; containing 
 156,000.000 of subjects and tributaries; of whom 
 120.000.000 are heathens and Mohammedans ! And 
 if to this military force, we add 13.000 constabulary 
 and metropolitan police, we have in this small island 
 a constant army of occupation of 38,000 men !* 
 
 You exclaim — Can such a force be required % at 
 least must it not supersede the necessity of jails and 
 gibbets % Alas ! it is a country of prisons as well as 
 garrisons. There are in Ireland 155 jails and bride- 
 wells ; near 700 law courts, from assizes to petty 
 sessions;! and 10,000 persons ministering to justice, 
 
 ♦Thorn's Statistics, 1852, p. 185. f lb. passim. 
 
THE MORAL. 85 
 
 from the judge to the bailiff.* And can this array 
 of tribunals be required ? Enter any southern court 
 whatever ; mark the crowds who throng the building 
 and hang round the door ; see the piles of indict- 
 ments, processes, and summonses ; observe the pro- 
 digious mass of business transacted during one single 
 term ; and then you may form some conception of 
 the gross amount of law going on continually over 
 the land with all its disorganizing influences. Yes, 
 and though weeks are frequently spent at the assizes 
 of one single county, yet the business is often left 
 unfinished, and special commissions are sometimes 
 required to relieve the crowded prisons. In fact, 
 our chief public buildings, in addition to poorhouses. 
 are jails and courthouses ; and our most flourishing 
 business is that of lawyers and solicitors. 
 
 Again, in Great Britain, with thrice the popula- 
 tion of Ireland, and this consisting largely of the de- 
 praved manufacturing classes, there were in 1850, 
 only 3 1 ,28 1 committals, while there were in Ireland 
 in the same year 33,320, or upwards of 3 to 1 !f 
 Yet this gives no accurate idea of the proportions of 
 actual crime in these two countries : for conspiracy 
 against the laws is in many parts of Ireland so per- 
 fect, that even assassinations take place in open day, 
 within view of scores of people ; and not only do they 
 not inform, but so screen the assassin that he often 
 eludes the utmost vigilance of the police. Nor is a 
 less mournful fact brought out by the relative pro- 
 
 * Onsus. '41. f Thorn's Statistics, 1802, pp. 199, 201. 
 
86 ALLEGED CAUSES. 
 
 portion of convictions. The same conspiracy against 
 law and justice appears in our very courts ; scenes 
 of perjury the most revolting are common on the wit- 
 ness table ; and in party cases, the frequent expres- 
 sion even of jurors, before entering the box at all, is 
 that they will " eat their boots" with hunger before 
 they find against the prisoner ! Hence the striking 
 fact, that while in Britain, of the above 31,281 com- 
 mittals, there were 23,900 convictions, or nearly three 
 fourths, of the 33,326 prisoners committed in Ire- 
 land, there were only 17.108 convicted, or not much 
 over one half* 
 
 Perhaps you exclaim — Surely this array of crime 
 must at least have been of the petty kind ! Alas ! 
 its character was as melancholy as its amount. One 
 fifth, at least, of the above convictions were for of- 
 fences of the highest class ; while of the entire num- 
 ber convicted, there were no less than 1,858 sen- 
 tenced to transportation, and 17 sentenced to death !f 
 All this, too, in a year of unusual peace ! Then 
 what must have been the statistics of our disturbed 
 years? In 1848, we had near 40,000 committals, 
 almost 3,000 sentenced to transportation, and 60 
 sentenced to death ! You say this was during the 
 famine period ? Alas ! it was even so. Unawed 
 by the wrath of Jehovah himself, as if made worse 
 by those fearful judgments which He sent to make 
 us better, the period of our greatest calamity was 
 that of our most dreadful wickedness, and the work 
 * Thorn's Statistics, pp. \'y-\ 201. f Ibid 
 
THE MORAL. 87 
 
 of blood went on most rapidly beneath the out- 
 stretched arm of the angel of death. 
 
 Now, if such an amount of crime loads our caUi- 
 dars, despite the vigilance of an omnipresent police, 
 the bristling of 38.000 bayonets, and the dread array 
 of courts and gibbets, it is surely impossible to re- 
 sist the conviction that were this enormous pressure 
 removed which keeps down the wild elements of vice 
 and crime, they would instantly burst forth with re- 
 sistless fury. Indeed, such has been somewhat the 
 case, even notwithstanding the presence of this force ; 
 for what has been Ireland's whole history but that 
 of a moral volcano of pent-up fires and periodical 
 eruptions, with whole counties in constant disturb- 
 ance, and the entire country in occasional rebellion 1 
 Therefore it is manifest that even the foregoing sta- 
 tistics give no clear idea of our actual condition. 
 Such an amount of crime can only exist where the 
 social mass is fearfully diseased ; and when correctly 
 yiewed, merely serves, like ulcers on the surface, to 
 show the depth and malignity of the internal disor- 
 der. And faithfulness compels us at once to say, 
 that with many honorable exceptions, there is in all 
 classes a want of that high moral tone on which so- 
 cial health so much depends, and from the absence 
 of which crime and misery necessarily spring. 
 
 We have glanced at our prevailing habits of idle- 
 ness, extravagance, and style. Now the history of 
 such habits has ever proved that their unhappy vic- 
 tims will live, if they can, at the expense of others, 
 
88 ALLEGED CAUSES. 
 
 when no longer able to live at their own, and not be 
 over-scrupulous about the means they adopt to pro- 
 long the dire struggle for existence. And so you 
 have, in our wretched land, the needy landlord rack- 
 ing the tenant, and the thriftless tenant evading his 
 exactions ;* the employer taking advantage of his 
 servants and tradesmen, and these taking their re- 
 venge by general unfaithfulness and frequent combi- 
 nations ; in a word, such a state of dishonesty, that 
 where any legal flaw is found in their bonds and con- 
 tracts, nine out of every ten usually take advantage 
 of it. This system of mutual wrong has, of course, 
 propagated and spread, giving birth, on the one hand, 
 to extortions, distraints, and ejectments, and, on the 
 other, to secret scheming, open resistance, and fre- 
 quent assassinations. And thus have matters gone 
 on for many years, till the unavoidable crisis has at 
 length arrived ; j r et you wonder at our country's 
 prostration, and speak as if some enchanter's curse 
 were mysteriously resting on her ! A country where 
 masters and mistresses must generally stand over 
 their servants to prevent their work from being de- 
 stroyed by carelessness or neglected through sloth ; 
 in whose very turnip fields you will see sheds erected, 
 where men keep nightly watch against the thief and 
 the robber ; in whose markets firkins of butter have 
 been seized for being partially filled with clay ; in 
 whose farm-yards constant vigilance is required to 
 
 * Inglis' Tour, p. 167. Indeed, these statements are con- 
 firmed by every author acquainted with Ireland. 
 
THE MORAL. 89 
 
 save the fowls from disappearing ; and where the 
 employer must often search his men, as they leave 
 his stores in the evening, to save himself from being 
 robbed ! A country which has long been proverbial 
 as the " land of jobbing ;" where exists an entire 
 class -called " Sunday men," from never being seen 
 except on Sabbaths, because they cannot then be ar- 
 rested for their debts : and where not only is the 
 arm of Justice paralyzed, but even the hand of Char- 
 ity so foully abused, that the paupers often steal the 
 bedclothes of the poor-houses which keep them alive, 
 and deeds were on all hands perpetrated in connec- 
 tion with the late government relief-money, which 
 we would positively blush to record ! Is it such a 
 country you would expect to prosper 1 Why, un- 
 less the laws of Heaven were reversed, and vice, not 
 virtue, was the basis of prosperity, the half of what 
 we have stated would blast the fairest land ; and yet 
 we have not stated the half of what exists. And it 
 is blindness, or something worse, to charge the fruits 
 of our own misdeeds on a Parliament which, with all 
 its erroneous legislation, has, at least, evinced some 
 desire to save us from ourselves. 
 
 Does any one deny these fearful statements, or 
 say that, even if true, they ought to be suppressed ? 
 
 Alas, to deny them were absurd, and to suppress 
 them were criminal. False delicacy has too long 
 concealed what faithfulness should have disclosed ; 
 and now that our country is sinking so fast, it were 
 monstrous treachery to cover up those malignant 
 
90 ALLEGED CAUSES. 
 
 ulcers of which she is expiring, when her life depends 
 upon faithful probing. 
 
 Knowledge and Virtue in Ulster. — If our so- 
 lution is the true one, then should Ulster, being the 
 most prosperous, be also the most enlightened and 
 virtuous part of Ireland. Now, by the census of 
 1841, the proportions of the population in each 
 province who could neither read nor write, were — 
 Ulster, 33 per cent. ; Leinster, 38 ; Munster, 52 ; 
 Connaught, 64. Thus, it appears that, of persons 
 totally ignorant, there were then in Ulster fewer by 
 one third than in Munster, and by one half than in 
 Connaught. Not less difference is found in the gen- 
 eral intelligence of those who can read and write ; 
 and much more in their religious knowledge — the 
 northern child evincing an acquaintance with revealed 
 truth not often found in the southern grandfather. 
 Indeed, the great educational superiority of Ulster 
 is clearly proved by the fact, that while Connaught 
 almost exclusively depends on National Schools for 
 education, and Ulster has many others besides, yet, 
 with twice the population, the latter province con- 
 tains thrice as many National Schools as the former.* 
 And, though a large number of the youth of Ulster 
 are educated at the Scotch universities, yet, during 
 the session of 1849, the students attending the Bel- 
 fast Queen's College amounted to 192 ; while, in 
 that of Cork, there were 115; in that of Galway 
 
 * Thorn's Statistics, 1852, p. 197. 
 
THE MORAL. 91 
 
 68; and of this latter number some of the most 
 eminent were natives of Ulster.* While, as to in- 
 dustrial knowledge, we shall only add, that the south 
 has been sending individuals to the north to learn 
 the cultivation and manufacture of flax ; and the 
 National Board is obliged to employ northern fe- 
 males to teach their southern schools the sewed mus- 
 lin manufacture. 
 
 The difference in moral character is still more re- 
 markable. Of the 25,000 troops usually stationed 
 in Ireland, scarce 3,000 are found in Ulster, and, ex- 
 cept in its southern counties, even these are wholly 
 unnecessary. Not a soldier is stationed between 
 Belfast and Derry, a distance of 70 miles, embra- 
 cing two most populous counties and various large 
 towns. Of our 13,000 police, the number stationed 
 in Ulster, in 1851, was 1,901, little more than a 
 seventh of the force for a third of the population.! 
 And our prison statistics prove that even these are 
 comparatively unnecessary. Of our 33,326 commit- 
 tals in 1850, the number in Ulster was 5,260, not 
 one sixth part.| Yet, considering how many crimes 
 escape detection in the south, from the prevailing 
 conspiracy against the laws, and how few, in the 
 north, from the opposite cause, even this is too large 
 a figure to represent the proportion of actual crime. 
 
 The character of crime shows a still more re- 
 markable difference. At almost every northern as- 
 
 * Thorn's Statistics, 1852, p. 193. \ Ibid. p. 180. 
 % Ibid. p. 199. 
 
92 ALLEGED CAUSES. 
 
 sizes, the first sentence of the judge's opening address 
 to the grand jury, is one of congratulation on the 
 peace of their county, and the lightness of their 
 calendar. Comparatively few are transported from 
 Ulster ; and capital crime occurs there so rarely, 
 that of 23 executions which took place in Ireland in 
 the years 1849 and 1850, only two occurred in 
 Ulster.* 
 
 In short, the vast moral superiority of that prov- 
 ince is seen on every hand. In many districts, the 
 doors of the dwellings are seldom locked ; in num- 
 bers of shops a child can safely deal ; while the 
 atrocities which are the rule elsewhere, are the ex- 
 ception in Ulster. There landlords are scarce ever 
 shot, or murderers sheltered, or wretches known to 
 swear away innocent life ; while in most counties, 
 assizes last a day or two, jails are half empty, and 
 gibbets scarce ever required. During the assassina- 
 tions of 1848, one threatening letter was sent to the 
 county Derry, to a landlord of high respectability ; 
 and it came from Connaught ! The excitement it 
 created was intense — abundant proof of the novelty 
 of the occurrence ; and the people formed themselves 
 into a guard, and kept sentry for weeks round the 
 gentleman's demesne : yet some journals would per- 
 suade us that, for the last few years, Ulster has be- 
 come a scene of agrarian disturbance ! 
 
 Now, of course it is impossible fully to estimate 
 the influence exerted on Ulster's prosperity by its 
 
 * Thorn's Statistics, 1852, p. 200. 
 
THE RELIGIOUS. 93 
 
 superior light and virtue ; in the security of proper- 
 ty, the influx of capital, the encouragement of enter- 
 prise, and, above all, that general elevation and suc- 
 cess which are the sure fruits of education and 
 morality. But some idea of its magnitude may be 
 formed from the fact, that with one third of the 
 population, Ulster's share of the police, jail, and 
 poor-law expenses of Ireland, is, in round numbers, 
 but one eighth ! 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 THE RELIGIOUS. 
 
 Thus far have we proceeded in unravelling the 
 perplexed web of causes from which Ireland's miser- 
 ies have sprung. Will the reader be kind enough 
 to accompany us one step further 1 After the most 
 careful estimate of the share which various alleged 
 causes of our country's wretchedness have had in 
 producing it, we have found the chief to be her 
 moral degradation. But it is manifest that this 
 cause must also be derivative ; and we know of but 
 two possible sources to which it can be traced : — ■ 
 some radical defect in the people themselves, or 
 some malignant influence to which they are ex- 
 posed. We have demonstrated that it is not the 
 forme)' ; and we have hitherto failed in our search 
 
94 ALLEGED CAUSES. 
 
 for the latter. We have seen that the Irish are 
 neither cursed with Moorish ferocity nor Boeotian 
 stupidity, and that neither in the country nor the 
 laws can any such evil influence be found as will at 
 all account for such fearful degradation. One other 
 field of inquiry alone remains. Is the cause to be 
 found in our Religious condition ? One would nat- 
 urally suppose that religion, professing, as it does, 
 to mould and regulate our whole nature, so as best to 
 fit us for earth and heaven, should exert on any 
 people a paramount influence for good. Why has it 
 not been so in Ireland? Has she not a sufficient 
 supply of Christian ministers? 2,176 Established 
 clergy, from the primate to the curate ; 2,361 
 Koman Catholic clergy, with a large auxiliary staff 
 of monks and nuns ; and 624 Presbyterian, with 
 281 Independent, Methodist, and Baptist minis- 
 ters?* Why, with such an army of ecclesiastics, 
 Ireland should be " an island of saints ;" and there 
 must be fearful guilt somewhere, when it is more 
 like an island of savages. Then, we solemnly cite 
 them to trial, that we may see at whose door lies 
 the tremendous guilt of having wrought such ruin 
 on a land so fair. Our rule of judgment shall be 
 that of One who cannot err — " Ye shall know 
 them by their fruits"! '■ — One who appealed to 
 his own works in proof of his divine commission \\ 
 
 * Thorn's Statistics, 1852, pp. 386-392, 414-421, 422-429, 
 430-432. f Matthew vii. 15-20. J John x. 37, 38. 
 
THE RELIGIOUS. 9' 
 
 disowns the church which cannot do the same ;* 
 proclaims all religions imposture that pretend to be 
 from God and are not like God :f and declares that 
 " in this the children of God are manifest, and the 
 children of the devil — whosoever doeth not right- 
 eousness is not of God. "| 
 
 4 
 
 The Coincidence. — The two great religious sys- 
 tems of these kingdoms are the Protestant and 
 Roman Catholic. It is clear from the above test, 
 that whichever of these most fuHy promotes " that 
 righteousness which exalteth a nation." gives the best 
 proof of its divinity. And should it be found that 
 one of them invariably exalts, and the other as in- 
 variably degrades a people, then is the one as certain- 
 ly true, and the other as certainly false, as though 
 the fact were proclaimed by an angel from heaven. 
 
 Now, if we compare our two islands, we find Great 
 Britain the most happy country on earth, perhaps 
 the most Protestant ; and Ireland the most wretched, 
 one of the most intensely Roman Catholic. Britain, 
 that little spot which would scarce be missed if sunk 
 beneath the waves, is the queen of nations, and her 
 name a passport among remote barbarians ; while 
 Roman Catholic Ireland, in all respects fitted by the 
 great Creator for sharing the glories of her sister 
 isle, is as utterly degraded as the other is illustrious ; 
 and the name of Irishman a term of as deep contempt 
 as that of Englishman is a title of honor. We find, 
 
 * John viii. 41, 44. \ 1 John iv. 1-6. % 1 John iii. 8, 10. 
 
 * 
 
96 ALLEGED CAUSES. 
 
 moreover, the most Protestant part of Great Britain 
 — Scotland — the most enlightened and virtuous ; and 
 the most Roman Catholic parts of Ireland — Con- 
 naught and Minister — the most benighted and de- 
 praved. Except in a few Highland districts there is 
 scarce a Roman Catholic in all Scotland who is not 
 Irish, while, at least until 1817, only one fifth of 
 Ireland's population was Protestant.* Yet the 
 former is a land of authors, the latter not even a land 
 of readers ; the one is as much distinguished for its 
 virtue as the other for its crime ; and even a large 
 portion of the crimes of the one is committed by 
 Irish Roman Catholics, while a mere fraction of the 
 crimes of the other is the work of Protestants. f 
 And lest this difference might be thought to arise, in 
 part at least, from the social or political state of 
 these two nations, follow them through all their mi- 
 gratory wanderings and it is still the same. In 
 every region you find the one filling the post of 
 honor and trust, and the other sweeping the streets 
 or carrying the hod ; and while the Scotchman in 
 
 * According to the Report of the Commissioners of Pub- 
 lic Instruction (1834), which contains our latest denomina- 
 tional census, «we find that Ireland then contained 1 517 228 
 Protestants, and 6 127 71- Roman Catholics Of Protes- 
 tants there were :— Established Church 858 004 ; Presbyte- 
 rians, G42 ; 356 ; Dissenters, 21,808 ; total, 1 517 228. From 
 the same source we learn that the entire Presbyterian body, 
 except about 4,300. are found in Ulster. 
 
 f This fact is forcibly brought out by the jail statistics of 
 Scotland. 
 
THE RELIGIOUS. 97 
 
 Ireland conducts our banks or warehouses, the Irish- 
 man in Scotland is found in the coal-pit or the 
 prison ! 
 
 If next we turn to Ireland itself, we find from the 
 census of 1834, that in Ulster the Protestants then 
 were to the Roman Catholics in round numbers as 
 11 to 19 : in Leinster as 2 to 11 ; in Munster as 1 
 to 20 ; and in Connaught as 1 to 23.* Now, we 
 have seen the immense difference between Protestant 
 Ulster and Roman Catholic Munster and Connaught 
 in their statistics of ignorance, crime, and poverty. 
 The brevity of this work has alone hindered us from 
 giving the statistics of Leinster. But any one who 
 consults the same authorities from which we have 
 taken those of the other three provinces, will find 
 that in all four as is the Protestantism, so are the 
 knowledge, virtue, and prosperity. To give one 
 more sample — in the year 1848, there were, in round 
 numbers, 3 persons receiving relief out of every 100 
 in Ulster; 7 in Leinster; 14 in Munster; and 19 
 
 * The Commissioners of Public Instruction have followed 
 the ecclesiastical, and not the civil divisions of the island. 
 Now, in their four ecclesiastical provinces, which, though 
 not quite coincident with the four civil ones, are sufficiently 
 so for our purpose, we find the religious denominations to 
 stand thus: — Province of Armagh, 1,1*71,618 Protestants, 
 and 1,955,123 Roman Catholics. Province of Dublin, 183,609 
 Protestants, and 1,063,681 Roman Catholics. Province of 
 Cashel, 115,233 Protestants, and 2,220,340 Roman Catholics. 
 Province of Tuam, 45,768 Protestants, and 1,188,568 Roman 
 Catholics. 
 
 1 
 
98 ALLEGED CAUSES. 
 
 in Connaught ! Here is a graduated scale singu- 
 larly correspondent to the Protestantism of each 
 province, and, excepting Connaught, the very reverse 
 of what we were entitled to expect. For, besides 
 other advantages, Leinster has long been the seat 
 of government, and enjoyed the benefits of the 
 •• English pale ;" not only is Minister the garden of 
 Ireland, but its population are the oldest inhabitants 
 of the land ; while Ulster is a mere colony little 
 more than 200 years old, and composed for the 
 most part of a few Scotch adventurers, who were 
 doomed to struggle for years against a host of diffi- 
 culties. 
 
 If from the provinces wo descend to the counties, 
 we find the same proportions prevailing with singu- 
 lar exactness. To make this perfectly clear, we 
 shall contrast a few of the most Protestant with a 
 few of the most Roman Catholic counties. In 
 Antrim, the Protestants are to the Roman Catho- 
 lics nearly as 3 to 1 ; in Down, more than 2 to 1 ; 
 in Derry, about 1 to 1 ; and in Donegal, 1 to 3 ; — ■ 
 while in Cork, they are 1 to 16; Limerick, 1 to 
 22 ; Kerry and Waterford, 1 to 23 ; Mayo and Gal- 
 way, 1 to 24.* Now, mark how the light of each 
 county is as its Protestantism, with only an excep- 
 tion which establishes the rule ; Donegal being 
 mountainous, without a single large town ; while 
 Cork and Limerick are full of populous towns, with 
 
 * Compare Report of Commissioners of Public Instruc- 
 tion, (1834.) 
 
THE RELIGIOUS. 99 
 
 all their educational facilities. In 1841, the propor- 
 tions who could neither read nor write, were — 
 Antrim., 23 per cent. ; Down, 27 ; Derry, 29 ; Lim- 
 erick, 55 ; Donegal, 62 ; Cork, 68 ; Kerry, 72 : 
 Waterford, 73 ; Galway, 78 ; and Mayo, 80.*' Thus 
 in the most Roman Catholic counties we have four 
 fifths of the people in total ignorance ; in the most 
 Protestant only one fifth ; and in all, with the above 
 exception, the ignorance increasing as the Protes- 
 tantism diminishes ! We might farther prove, that 
 in all those counties those who can neither read nor 
 write, are almost all Roman Catholics. Instance 
 Donegal, the only county out of its place in the 
 above scale ; and according to a report of the Rev. 
 E. M. Clarke, chaplain and local inspector, of 138 
 Protestants confined in Lifford jail in 1849, 91, or 
 near three fourths, could read ; while of 922 Roman 
 Catholic prisoners, only 213, or not one fourth, 
 could read.f Indeed, all those districts which are 
 remarkable for their religious and general ignorance, 
 such as the West Coast region above noticed, are 
 those in which the Church of Rome has for ages 
 held unbroken sway. 
 
 Nor is the contrast less remarkable in the crime 
 than the ignorance of these counties. In the four 
 Protestant counties of Antrim, Down, Derry, and 
 Donegal, the gross number of committals, in 1848, 
 was not in proportion to the population one fourth 
 
 * Extracted from Census of 1841. 
 
 \ Derry Standard, February 21, 1850. 
 
100 ALLEGED CAUSES. 
 
 that of the four Romau Catholic counties of Kerry 
 Limerick, Gal way, and Mayo ; yet. of the latter, 
 none but Limerick belong to the " disturbed dis- 
 tricts."* Again, while from the prevailing conspir- 
 acy against justice in the latter, their convictions 
 are not much over a third of their committals, in 
 the former they are nearly four fifths. And there 
 is really no comparison as to the character of the 
 offences : — for example, of 09 criminals hanged in 
 Ireland, in the 6 years ending 1850, 13 were exe- 
 cuted in Limerick alone, only 4 were hanged in 
 Ulster, and only 1 in any of the above Protestant 
 counties — viz., in Donegal, the least Protestant. 
 Finally, as a mere sample of their temporal condi- 
 tion, we find that, in the 4 Roman Catholic unions 
 of Kanturk, Listowel, Castlebar, and Ballinrobe, 
 there were, in 1848, twelve times as many paupers 
 relieved, in proportion to their population, as in the 
 4 Protestant unions of Larne, Kilkeel, Coleraine, 
 and Newton Limavady. And the awful state of 
 these unions may be conceived from the fact, that 
 half the population of Listowel, and one third that of 
 Castlebar and Ballinrobe, were at that period obliged 
 to support the remainder !f 
 
 Lest any remnant of doubt should hang on the 
 reader's mind as to the extent of the coincidence we 
 are tracing ; lest he should cherish the least suspi- 
 cion that Ulster owes its superiority to some other 
 
 * Thorn's Statistics, 1852, pp. 199, 200. 
 f Ibid./ 1849, pp. 144-148. 
 
THE RELIGIOUS. 101 
 
 cause which we are unable to discover or unwilling 
 to disclose — let us turn for a moment to its own 
 counties. While in Antrim, its most Protestant 
 county, the per centage who cannot read or write is 
 
 23 ; in Cavan, its most Roman Catholic, it is 51. 
 With a population a little over that of Deny, that 
 county has annually twice as many committals, and 
 not one third the proportionate number of convic- 
 tions.* The number of police stationed in Derry in 
 1850 was 106, at the expense of £5,299; while in 
 Cavan there were 396, at the cost of £16,985 — over 
 thrice the expense, and near four times the force, f 
 In short, Cavan is notoriously the most turbulent 
 county in Ulster, and constantly occupied by a large 
 body of military : while the only troops in the entire 
 county of Derry, are a depot stationed in London- 
 derry city, whose services are scarcely ever required. 
 From counties we might even descend to parishes. 
 One of the richest in Antrim is the parish of Killa- 
 gan. and one of the poorest, that of Cushendun : yet 
 in the former the Protestants are to the Roman 
 Catholics as 6 to 1, and in the latter as 1 to 9.J 
 Do you say the northern Roman Catholic was 
 driven back to the mountains by the Ulster set- 
 tlers ? Then we ask, What has so generally driven 
 the southern Roman Catholic to the mountains too ? 
 By what other foes has he been pursued thither 
 than those evil habits which compel men to retire 
 
 * Thorn's Statistics, 1852, p. 199. f Ibid -> P- 18 °- 
 
 % Ibid., p. 183. 
 
102 ALLEGED CAUSES. 
 
 before the advance of light and virtue 1 But not to 
 dwell on this, go to some of our finest plains, where 
 no stranger has disturbed the southern. In the dio- 
 cese of Cashel, Roman Catholics are to Protestants 
 in the enormous disproportion of 28 to 1 ; and that 
 naturally luxuriant region has long been known as 
 the place where the demon of murder holds his 
 com t, and those assassination clubs have existed 
 wh( re each deed of blood is deliberately planned. 
 Do you impute these crimes to landlord oppression? 
 W s ask not why such oppression, often as intoler- 
 ab e in Ulster, occasions there so few dreadful 
 cr mes, and why these few are almost exclusively 
 c< mmitted by Roman Catholics ; but we take you 
 at once to the towns, where no landlord can rack, 
 but men rise or sink by their own conduct. In- 
 stance Belfast and Cork, in the former of which 
 Roman Catholics are to Protestants as 1 to 2-£, and 
 in the latter as 5 to 1 ; and in the ten years ending 
 1851, the population of Belfast has increased 
 24,400, or near 33 per cent., and its trade and 
 manufactures proportionally : while the population 
 of Cork has in the same period increased 5,700, or 
 not 5 per cent. ; and even this consists for the most 
 part of paupers, whom, during the last 5 years, 
 want has driven in from the surrounding country ! 
 Nay, pass if you please through the streets of each 
 town, and you will find that in both, and with the 
 very same opportunities, the Protestants are the high- 
 est, and the Roman Catholics the lowest of the people. 
 
THE RELIGIOUS. 103 
 
 We really must not weary the reader : — but as 
 the last resistless proof of the fact we are establish- 
 ing, examine the individuals of each persuasion, 
 and you will find the Roman Catholics as a class 
 everywhere the lowest in knowledge, virtue, and 
 wealth. — the uneducated, the criminals, the servants 
 of their own land. And this is so common as to be 
 the subject of frequent remark amongst themselves. 
 It is notorious that during the late famine, even in 
 Ireland's most Protestant parts, the immense pro- 
 portion of the relieving were Protestants, and of the 
 relieved, Roman Catholics. The vast majority of 
 our prisoners, even in Protestant districts, are Ro- 
 man Catholics. And our poor-house, jail, and hos- 
 pital statistics usually show, from twice to four 
 times as many Romanist as Protestant inmates, in 
 proportion to the denominations of each district. 
 We have already seen the proportion in the Done- 
 gal jail,* and we find much the same in all the rest. 
 On the 8th of May, 1850, there were in Derry, 41 
 Protestant and 118 Roman Catholic prisoners — be- 
 ing three times as many of the latter, in proportion 
 to the population of the county ; and on the 14th 
 
 * Mr. Clarke, in his Report, pronounces a high eulogium 
 on ■• the admirable conduct of the Presbyterians of Done- 
 gal, as evinced by the fact, that of a body exceeding 40\000, 
 only 26 were committed within the year." The design 
 of this work prevents us from giving the poor-house, prison, 
 and education statistics of the various Protestant denomi- 
 nations ; but it is only justice to the Presbyterian body here 
 to state, that these statistics assign the first place to them. 
 
104 ALLEGED CAUSES. 
 
 of May. in the same year, there were in Tralee jail 
 572 Roman Catholic and only 4 Protestant prison- 
 ers. In short, turn where you will, and the result 
 is the same ; you can generally tell the prevailing 
 denomination from the appearance of every parish, 
 every village, and almost every house in the land. 
 
 The Inference. — How is it possible to account 
 for this ? If Romanism be true and Protestantism 
 false, Ireland's mystery was never half so dark as 
 now ; for, in all other cases, has truth exalted and 
 error debased mankind : but here we have degrada- 
 tion the offspring of heaven, and elevation the child 
 of hell. But only venture the supposition that Ro- 
 manism is false and Protestantism true, and like 
 some dissected map the most shapeless part of Ire- 
 land's puzzle falls into its place in a moment. Ob- 
 serve how it unfolds every mystery in our physical 
 and moral state ; and explains why the " Black 
 North" is a garden, and the " Sunny South" a wil- 
 derness ; why southern jails are crowded, and north- 
 ern ones half empty ; and why the southern, with 
 naturally the finest parts, is yet so degraded. Mark 
 how it solves our political enigmas : shows why 
 Ulster flourishes and Munster declines beneath the 
 same laws ; and not only explains why the country 
 grows worse as her legislation grows better, but de- 
 monstrates that it must be so, if our rulers have at 
 the same time been encouraging Rome. See what 
 light it throws on Ireland's history ; explaining the 
 
THE RELIGIOUS. 105 
 
 well-known fact, that it was while her principles 
 were Protestant she was the school of Europe, and 
 that from the hour the sword of Henry and the 
 treachery of Adrian forced her to bow at the Vir- 
 gin's shrine, her glory departed, and she sunk into 
 wretchedness. And observe how it accounts for 
 the alternate fall and rise of the Celt and Saxon in 
 the social scale ; nay. for the otherwise inexplicable 
 shift ings on that Scale, which we have noticed, of 
 the Celtic tribes themselves : explaining how the fall 
 of Celtic Ireland dates from her submission to the 
 Pope, and the rise of Saxon Britain from the hour 
 she flung his yoke away ;* how the Celts of Britain 
 continued Popish long after their Saxon brethren, 
 and just so long did their mountains ring with the 
 shouts of embattled clansmen ; and how, from the 
 very moment the Reformation reached them, were 
 their claymores sheathed, and their mountains 
 echoed far other sounds. 
 
 Nay, the history of Europe is explained by the 
 same key. Rome was in her zenith during those 
 " dark ages" which men now blush to recall, and the 
 darkness thickened the mightier she grew ; but the 
 Reformation dawned, and with it rose the sun of 
 
 * We know that the Magna Charta, the Crusades, &c., 
 had before the Reformation done much for England ; we 
 only maintain that they were more overruled than designed 
 for her good. The Magna Charta itself owed its existence 
 more to the selfishness than the patriotism of the barons, 
 and was meant to increase their own power rather than the 
 people's freedom. 
 
106 ALLEGED CAUSES. 
 
 Europe. And mark how those countries only sprung 
 to life which this Reformation visited. Germany 
 Holland, Britain, emerged at the same instant from 
 Rome and misery : Spain and Italy retained their 
 allegiance, and grew more wretched. Ay, and so 
 uniform is this connection between Protestantism 
 and prosperity, that it seems scarcely affected by 
 climate, or soil, or race, or government, or any other 
 usually modifying cause. On the mountains of 
 Spain, and the plains of Italy ; beneath the despot- 
 ism of Austria, and the freedom of Switzerland ; in 
 the empire of Brazil, and the republic of Mexico ; 
 the same blight marks the dominion of Rome. 
 While the same blessing rests on the realms of Prot- 
 estantism, whether in bleak Scotland or genial Eng- 
 land, or swampy Holland, or Alpine Switzerland, or 
 the United States of America, or the remote isles 
 of the Pacific* 
 
 * The only exception which even Roman Catholics at- 
 tempt to urge is that of Belgium. Suppose we admit it, 
 " the exception proves the rule." But local causes may 
 modify the influence of any religion. Such causes exist in 
 Belgium ; among which are freehold farms and a liberal 
 constitution ; and making due allowance for these, the con- 
 dition of that country is the strongest confirmation of the 
 fact we are establishing. The most prosperous part of Bel- 
 gium is the most Protestant; the south-west, the most Ro- 
 man Catholic, is styled from its misery the " Ireland of Bel- 
 gium." The manufactures, for which that country gets 
 credit, were introduced by the French Protestant refugees ; 
 while its general prosperity is much overrated, as is proved 
 
THE RELIGIOUS. 107 
 
 And the most striking fact of all is, that the in- 
 tenser the Romanism the blight is the deeper, and 
 the purer the Protestantism the blessing is the 
 greater. Either the law of moral influence is a de- 
 lusion, or the more numerous the priests, they must, 
 if their system is good, exert the greater influence 
 for good, and a country's virtue will be as the num- 
 ber of their chapels. Now, in Scotland, the most 
 virtuous land on earth, the priests of Rome scarcely 
 exist ; in Spain, the most debased, they are literally 
 swarming ; Rome, their headquarters, is a sink of 
 iniquity ; and the Irish, everywhere degraded, are 
 everywhere the most intense Roman Catholics. 
 Unless, therefore, you believe that God's religion 
 would blast, and Satan's bless mankind ; "or that 
 God, in aiming to raise fallen men, has failed of his 
 aim and degraded them, and that Satan, in aiming 
 to debase them, has failed of his aim and exalted 
 them : — nay, unless you admit the horrid blasphemy, 
 that in all ages the Holy One has been the patron 
 of vice and the Evil One of virtue — that God and 
 Satan have exchanged characters, and heaven and 
 hell changed places — then is the Romish system 
 weighed in the balance and found wanting. For on 
 no land has the Sun of Righteousness ever risen 
 without bathing it in floods of light and virtue ; nor 
 the clouds of error ever fallen without sinking it in 
 
 by the fact, that no country but Ireland was the scene of 
 such horrors during the late potato failure. — (See Edin- 
 bv.rgh Witness, Jan. 19, 1850.) 
 
108 ALLEGED CAUSES. 
 
 darkness and vice. Reader ! is all this true — is the 
 half of it true ? Then, if you have any concern in 
 the matter, are you bound by the most solemn obli- 
 gations to accompany us while we inquire — Why 
 
 IS DEGRADATION THE CONSTANT FRUIT OF RoMA N- 
 ISM? 
 
PART III. 
 THE GRAND CAUSE. 
 
 The moral universe, like the material, is upheld 
 by a few simple laws-, on the observance of which 
 its existence depends. These, like their Author, 
 are infinitely wise and good ; therefore, their viola- 
 tion must be incalculably disastrous ; and the only 
 possible mode of arresting such disaster when it 
 occurs, is to restore the violated laws to their full 
 sway again. All true religion rests on this proposi- 
 tion. And as our demonstration shall be based on 
 it, we beg the reader's special attention to it. 
 
 Two of these laws we have found to be knowledge 
 and virtue. And it has often been demonstrated, 
 that the law by which the stone falls and vapor 
 ascends, is not more necessary to the material uni- 
 verse than these are to the moral.* But the sum 
 of all knowledge is acquaintance with God and his 
 works ; and the sum of all virtue, because of all the 
 commandments, is love to God and our neighbor.! 
 And from these all good springs — whatever coun- 
 
 * See Dick's Christian Philosopher, 
 f Matthew xxii. 37-40. 
 
110 THE GRAND ('.VISE. 
 
 try, whatever world lias most of them, must be most 
 prosperous, exalted, and happy. 
 
 Man was made under these laws, and adapted to 
 them — with a mind to acquire knowledge, a con- 
 science to practise virtue, and a heart to feel love. 
 And, of course, as these chief parts of his being are 
 improved or injured, must his wiiole nature be ele- 
 vated or debased. 
 
 Now. the end of religion is just to train man in 
 obedience t<> ihcte laws. And the simplest possible 
 test by which to know how far any religion is true 
 or false, and therefore how far it is beneficial or per- 
 nicious, is to ascertain how far it accomplishes this 
 end. Take a simple illustration : — 
 
 Science holds that place in the material world 
 which religion does in the moral ; — it deals icith 
 the material laws. Now, true science proceeds in 
 strict obedience to these laws ; explains every phe- 
 nomenon by them, and therefore, like them, is beau- 
 tifully self-consistent, unchanging, wise, and bene- 
 ficial ; while false science is based on ignorance or 
 disregard of these laws, and hence is contradictory, 
 fluctuating, absurd, and mischievous. Thus, true 
 science explains eclipses and diseases, and regulates 
 navigation and the healing art by the laws which 
 govern the stars and the human body respectively, 
 and is, therefore, the parent of manifold blessings ; 
 while false science, disregarding these laws, has 
 given birth to astrology and quackery, and those 
 endless superstitions, with all their absurdity and 
 
BASIS OF DEMONSTRATION. 1 1 1 
 
 mischief, which have in all ages made millions the 
 dupes of imposture, trembling at eclipses, consulting 
 the stars, and using charms for the cure of diseases. 
 Just in like manner 1nic religion, regulating oar 
 moral cure by the laws which govern our moral 
 nature, is beautifully self consistent, wise, and be- 
 nign, and is the great parent of happiness here and 
 hereafter ; while false religion, disregarding these 
 laws, is absurd and mischievous, giving birth to 
 those various superstitions which have in all ages 
 led men to crouch before priests, and rely for salva- 
 tion on the senseless mummeries of idolatry. 
 
 • Try any false science by this test, and it is detected 
 in an instant. But just by the same test do we de- 
 tect a false religion. See, for instance, how, before 
 its tremendous light, Paganism and Mohammedan- 
 ism vanish like fogs before the morning sun. If, 
 therefore, we find in the Romish system the same 
 defiance of the laws of God and of man's nature, 
 and the same inconsistency and absurdity, it inevi- 
 tably follows that it must be equally false and per- 
 nicious. 
 
 Now, we solemnly charge that system with setting 
 these laws as completely at defiance, as though its 
 aim were to thwart them all ; — with being the enemy 
 of knoidedge, virtue, and love, and thus entailing on 
 its victims degradation and ruin ; with attempting 
 to eclipse the mind, corrupt the conscience, destroy 
 the heart, debase the tvhole nature, and thus ruin 
 man's temporal state, and blight his eternal prospects. 
 
112 THE GRAND CAUSE. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 ROME ECLIPSES THE MIND. 
 
 The glory of our race is mind. It lifts us above 
 the brutes and assimilates us to the angels. The 
 religion, therefore, whose effect is to extinguish or 
 dull this immortal spark, must be the enemy of God 
 and man. 
 
 Now, mark the uniform conduct of Rome. She 
 knows that " God is light." and Satan the prince of 
 darkness ; that the very first voice of Jehovah which 
 echoed through chaos, was, " Let there be light," and 
 that the arch-fiend's first utterance over this fair 
 earth, was, " Let there be darkness ;" and that ac- 
 cordingly God created man in " knowledge," and 
 Satan has shrouded the world in ignorance. She 
 knows, too, that the grand struggle of God's servants 
 in all ages has been to banish this darkness, and of 
 Satan's to deepen its gloom ; insomuch, that from 
 this their very titles are derived — the " powers of 
 light" — the "powers of darkness." 
 
 Now, amongst which of these does she range her- 
 self? None knows better than that sagacious church, 
 that u knowledge is power," and that the only possi- 
 ble way to elevate mind is to enlighten it. She 
 knows, moreover, that God only needs to be known 
 in order to be loved ; that men hate him because 
 they do not know Him ; that religion is therefore 
 
ROME ECLIPSES THE MIND. 113 
 
 called the knowledge of the Lord ; and that the 
 shortest way to bring on the millennium, is to " fill 
 the earth with this knowledge."* She is well aware 
 that it is because the arch-deceiver knows this too, 
 that lie has ever struggled to shroud the world in 
 midnight; and hence, that to spread light is to fol- 
 low, and to extinguish it is to thwart the laws of 
 God and of man's nature. And she is equally aware 
 that truth has everything to gain by the light, while 
 it is only imposture that can profit by darkness ; and 
 therefore that all honest men love the light, while 
 only Satan and his servants hate it — like^he lurking 
 assassin, and for the same reason. Yet in the full 
 consciousness of all this — knowing that by opposing 
 the light, she not only violates the laws of Grod and 
 our nature, but exposes herself to the very ivorst 
 suspicions, her whole history has been one dire strug- 
 gle against it. 
 
 Religious Knowledge. — Shall we commence 
 with her own beloved maxim, " Ignorance is the 
 mother of devotion V According to this matchless 
 aphorism. He who gave us reason demands its ex- 
 tinction as the first requisite of worship ; He who 
 made us above the brutes frowns on our homage 
 till we make ourselves equal to them; and He, 
 whom to know is to love, so ill bears inspection, that 
 the less we know Him we love Him the better ! 
 Why, it is not even an ingenious apology for delusion. 
 
 * Isaiah xi. 9. 
 8 
 
114 THE GRAND CAUSE. 
 
 and, except for its blasphemy, is really not worthy 
 the old serpent. According to it, the most degraded 
 savage must be the most devout, Christ's minister's 
 the most godless, and Adam vastly improved by the 
 fall. In a word, barbarism must be the best state, 
 and civilization the worst ; Paganism is the world's 
 blessing, and Christianity its curse ; the apostles de- 
 served martyrdom, and their murderers canonization ; 
 the Prince of Light is the world's worst enemy, and 
 the Prince of Darkness its truest friend ! ! God has 
 said, " My people perish for lack of knowledge." 
 And so to make himself known He has hung out 
 Creation, and written his Word ; and on the won- 
 drous cross has shown us " deity full robed," " in all 
 his round of rays complete." Well, the universe 
 gaze enraptured ; heaven rings witn hallelujahs ; 
 earth is commanded to echo the news. Forth steps 
 this system, and bids heaven and earth be hushed ; 
 burns the book which tells of his love — the only 
 book God ever wrote ; tears down the superscription 
 which even a pagan put over the cross ; and draws 
 the pall of night over the world ! 
 
 Now, fancy three thousand priests for ages en- 
 forcing this maxim in every corner of Ireland with a 
 fierceness of which the following are but a few 
 samples. The " greater excommunication" contains 
 the most fearful torrent of curses that ever issued 
 from the mouth of hell !* Any one so cursed is 
 
 * Of this hideous production, which would fill two pages 
 of this book, we give the following specimens : — " May the 
 
ROME ECLIPSES THE MIND. 115 
 
 supposed to be thereby hopelessly damned. No one. 
 on pain of the same doom, must speak to him, shelter 
 him, or give him a morsel, though starving ; and 
 while the " curse" was still powerful in Ireland, you 
 might have seen the people running away as the 
 cursed individual approached, lest the earth should 
 open and swallow them ! Well, let any of their 
 flocks send their children to an industrial school, to 
 learn virtue, industry, and the fear of God, and this 
 curse is levelled at their heads, accompanied by the 
 most exciting harangues from the altar ; the people 
 are often urged to deeds of blood, and the priest 
 sets the example with his horsewhip or cudgel. 
 Even in the enlightened county Antrim, priest 
 Walsh pronounced this curse on a poor miller for 
 reading the Irish Bible to his neighbors. The 
 priest of Achill commanded his flock to have pitch- 
 forks well sharpened, and, in case Mr. Nangle, or 
 any of his agents entered their houses, one was to 
 stand at the back door, and another at the front, 
 
 Father, who created man, curse him ! May the Son, who 
 suffered for us, curse him ! May the Holy Ghost, who is 
 given to us in baptism, curse him ! May all the angels, 
 and archangels, and. saints^ damn him ! May the heavens, 
 and earth, and all the holy things contained therein, damn 
 him ! May he be damned wherever he shall be ! May he 
 be cursed inwardly and outwardly ! May he be cursed in 
 the hair of his head ! May he be cursed in his brains, 
 temples, forehead, ears, eyebrows," &c. &c. Here follows a 
 minute enumeration of every part of the body, to the very 
 " toe-nails," and each is severally " damned" ! ! 
 
116 THE GRAND CAUSE. 
 
 to render escape impossible ; while he uttered the 
 most frightful imprecations on all who would even 
 work for Mr. Nangle, which he described as working 
 for the devil ; and he u prayed that those who dis- 
 obeyed his orders might not have a child that day 
 twelvemonth, and that when they died they might 
 have none to stretch them/'* This pious example 
 has been diligently followed elsewhere. A late de- 
 voted lady was, for keeping a farm school in the 
 neighborhood of Milltown, county Kerry, the fre- 
 quent subject of such altar abuse by the parish priest 
 as we cannot pollute our pages with : her boys have 
 been repeatedly cursed in the chapel, and assaulted 
 on the roads ; and twice, on the sabbath evenings 
 after such denunciations, were a number of persons, 
 including the writer, set on and stoned by the Mill- 
 town mob. While, on one occasion, at Ballymaciola, 
 he and an entire congregation were attacked by priest 
 Timlin and an infuriated rabble, and a number of 
 persons were brutally beaten. 
 
 The chief object of all this deadly hatred is the 
 Bible. When any of their flocks are suspected of 
 the crime of stealing a little light from this blessed 
 book, they frequently enter their houses and searcli the 
 chest, the bed straw, the very rafters, for it ; and 
 when they have found it, they have been known to 
 take it up in the tongs, lest it should pollute their 
 fingers, fling it into the fire, and burn it to ashes ! 
 
 * See Hon. and Rev. Baptist Noel's Tour in Ireland, pp. 
 171, 172. 
 
ROME ECLIPSES THE MIND. 117 
 
 The Bible ! that blessed volume, which suits every 
 taste but a corrupt one ; which teaches nothing but 
 truth and virtue, and opposes nothing but error and 
 sin : that emanation of God's own mind, and there- 
 fore pure as the mind that produced it ; whose plain 
 lessons no man can follow without becoming G-odlike, 
 and no country could obey without becoming an 
 Eden ; that book has ever been the object of Rome's 
 relentless hate — cursed from the altar, burned by 
 the hangman, and its readers butchered by thousands ! 
 What Pope has not hurled his anathemas against it ? 
 It was one of the last acts of the late pontiff, and 
 one of the first acts of the present one, to write 
 " Encyclical Letters" against it. Even the " liber- 
 al" Dr. Doyle compared Bible Societies, for mis 
 chief, to Whiteboy societies, and the Bible itself to 
 the works of Rousseau ; and loudly extolled a cer- 
 tain man for having buried in the earth a Bible that 
 had been given him ! And not to weary the reader 
 with proofs which we might furnish from every county, 
 let them take the following sample of the harangues 
 of the Irish priests against it. Preaching before 
 Dr. M'Hale and a number of his clergy ; and choos- 
 ing, no doubt, the theme most grateful to sacerdotal 
 ears, Friar Jennings thus exclaims : — " As the 
 poison of Bible information is fast falling and spread- 
 ing, in this parish particularly, you ought, by all 
 means possible, to put a stop to the machinations of 
 these heretics ; for assuredly any one who practises 
 the reading of the Bible will inevitably fall into 
 
118 THE GRAND CAUSE. 
 
 everlasting destruction. Why would you permit 
 persons who bring with them the worst of all pesti- 
 lence, the infectious pestilence of the Bible, which 
 would entail on yourselves and your children the 
 everlasting ruin of your souls? They who send 
 their children to schools where the Scriptures are 
 read, do give their children bound in chains to the 
 devil !"* 
 
 Is it strange that our country is filled with dark- 
 ness and crime, whose very altars ring with such 
 heaven-daring blasphemy? This blessed book is so 
 pure and holy, that it is easy enough to account for 
 the hatred which devils and wicked men feel against 
 it. Hence it has ever been the chief ground of con- 
 flict between the servants of light and the legions 
 of darkness. And in this fearful struggle we have 
 ranged on one side, prophets and apostles, and the 
 world's brightest worthies ; and on the other, the 
 entire brood of infidels and criminals, from Voltaire 
 to the vilest wretch that ever rotted in the purlieus 
 of vice. Well, here we have this " Church of God" 
 leading this crusade against the book of God, and 
 ranged with Paine against Paul, with Julian against 
 Jesus, with the scum of the earth against its very 
 salt. And what is the plea for this deadly hatred ? 
 Because it is obscure and misleads the people ! So, 
 then, the effect of a book all truth is to deceive, and 
 of a volume all divine is to damn ! And He who 
 can neither err nor deceive, gave it to us in the full 
 * Protestant Penny Magazine, No. xxvii. p. 39. 
 
, ROME ECLIPSES THE MIND. 119 
 
 foreknowledge that it would thus mislead us, aud 
 the better to insure our ruin, commands us to read 
 it;* and His priests must step in to arrest the rash 
 production, and save His cause from being destroyed 
 by Himself! Why, if there was one shred of hon- 
 esty in this plea, then should every chapel resound 
 Avith expositions, and every parish teem with com- 
 mentaries on it, Yet you will travel days without 
 finding amongst their flocks even a Douay Bible 
 with their own notes ; and be tired of life ere you 
 hear of a course of lectures on the gospel from a 
 single altar. Nay, their own primate Cullen rages 
 against those who would circulate it as " Bible 
 hawkers." and their own organ, the " Tablet," raves 
 about the places where it is circulated as " hells 
 opened !" But this plea has not even the merit of 
 ingenuity. No man can follow its plain directions 
 without becoming virtuous : and this is to misunder- 
 stand it ! The nursery child whose eye glistens 
 delighted at its stories, unconsciously testifies that 
 it has reached that highest climax of simplicity, 
 plainness enough for the infant mind ; and this is to 
 be unintelligible ! What if, after all, its real fault 
 is this very simplicity ? Had it been filled with 
 such foolish jargon as the Breviary, or the Lives of 
 Saints, it might not have been so much hated by 
 those champions of plainness, who oifer the very 
 prayers of the altar in an unknown tongue. It is 
 not the spots but the splendor of the morning sun 
 
 * John v. 39. 
 
120 THE GRAND CAUSE. 
 
 that makes him feared and shunned by the birds 
 of night ; and the Bible's true crime in the eyes 
 of Rome, is not its obscurity but its celestial clear- 
 ness. 
 
 Again, who can help admiring the matchless de- 
 vice of a Christian Ministry, and the moral power 
 of a gospel pulpit ; or contrasting the Christ-like 
 pastor with the pagan priest, and the divine service 
 of the Christian church with the mummeries of a 
 heathen fane ? Mark that man of God, moving 
 through his flock a living sample of holiness ; on 
 Sabbath teaching truth divine, and through the 
 week exemplifying it : 
 
 " The man whose heart is warm, 
 
 Whose hands are pure, whose doctrine and whose life 
 
 Coincident, exhibit lucid proof 
 
 That he is honest in the sacred cause." 
 
 Now, turn we from this charming picture to the 
 Irish priest and altar. Taken usually from the 
 lowest of the people, and often from turning the 
 spit or tending cattle not their own, the Maynooth 
 students are rude enough samples of the lignum 
 sacerdotis. You would say they have but one 
 chance of becoming educated men and gentlemen, 
 and that is found in the college they attend. Well, 
 that college is usually Maynooth. In its cells they 
 are immured — their books a few monkish authors, 
 their companions, youths as raw as themselves — and 
 there, as best they can, they must form their man- 
 
ROME. ECLIPSES THE MIND. 121 
 
 ners on the one, and their minds on the other. 
 There they are trained in the casuistries of Bailly, 
 the subtleties of Delahogue, and the legends of But- 
 ler ; — the first of these being a book so vile, that 
 Napoleon himself prohibited its use ; and if this is 
 one of Rome's sacred books, what must be her pro- 
 fane ones ? There they are taught that Torquemada 
 was a saint, and A'Becket a martyr, and the world's 
 brightest worthies detestable heretics. And, after 
 a course of training, devised with fearful skill, to 
 shrivel the mind and wither the heart, in which 
 bigotry can scarce help blackening into fanaticism, 
 forth they are poured like a fiery flood from this 
 ' : spiritual vomitory," to spread ignorance and error 
 through the land. Forth comes the scion of May- 
 nooth — how different even from the "continental" 
 priest ! — a sad instance of the intoxicating effects 
 of shallow draughts from the Pierian spring, to 
 bluster and swagger through some hapless parish, 
 and perhaps swear at and horsewhip some degraded 
 flock. 
 
 You deem this picture colored ? Could you only 
 hear some of those gems of literature which issue 
 from hundreds of Irish altars, you would condemn 
 it for its dulness. If any hapless parishioner has 
 failed to pay his dues, or otherwise incurred the 
 wrath of his priest, woe to that person ; for if any- 
 thing can be said against his fair name, the congre- 
 gation are most likely to be edified with it all. We 
 have known even the under garments of the females 
 
122 THE GRAND CAUSE. 
 
 to be attacked, for want of a better theme. If a 
 landlord is to be denounced, or if an election is ap- 
 proaching in which an obnoxious candidate must be 
 opposed, the work is done in the house of prayer, 
 the better to screen the instigator from public jus- 
 tice. Who has not heard of the altar advice, once 
 deliberately given to a congregation, to kidnap the 
 Protestant electors and confine them until after the 
 election ? and " if." added the priest. " any one meets 
 you and asks you what yon are doing, tell them you 
 are hunting corncrakes !" Another priest declared 
 that the lady who kept the farm-school already no- 
 ticed, was nightly visited by infernal spirits ; anoth- 
 er, that devils were swarming in the rafters of the 
 house of a Scripture reader named Davern, and 
 that he had seen them there himself ; while a third 
 assured his flock that Satan had been seen rising out 
 of Lough Corrib — his whole body, from his " enor- 
 mous head" to his " ponderous tail" being made of 
 stirabout, and that therefore if they would not with- 
 draw their children from Mr. Dallas's schools, they 
 might in the stirabout they got there eat his " satanic 
 majesty" himself unawares.* Such outrageous ef- 
 fusions are multitudes doomed to receive as their 
 Sabbath instructions — not even " stones" instead of 
 "bread," but "serpents" instead of "fish." That 
 blessed engine, the putjrit, is perverted into one of 
 mischief ; the very conduits of the waters of life are 
 thus by Satan seized and poisoned ; and yet you 
 
 * Gregg's Visit to Connemara, p. 13. 
 
ROME ECLIPSES THE MIND. 123 
 
 wonder how our countrymen's hearts are so de- 
 praved, and their minds so degraded. 
 
 But even these are trifling samples. A flourish- 
 ing Presbyterian mission exists in Mayo. During 
 the horrors of 1847, the priest of the district as- 
 sured the people that the famine was sent them as a 
 judgment for tolerating the k> missionaries." One 
 of them reminded his flock that it was the north 
 wind which usually blasted their potato stalks ; and 
 declared that not a single potato would grow in Con- 
 naught till the •• northern heretics" were expelled. 
 The curate of Ballycastle asserted that " not till 
 pearls would grow in his boots," would they other- 
 wise expect the potatoes to return. Another de- 
 clared from the altar that Mr. Brannigan was not a 
 human being, but " one of the fallen angels" who 
 had assumed the appearance of a man ; and threat- 
 ened that unless the people removed their children 
 from the mission schools, he would turn one half of 
 them " into hares, and the other into hounds, and 
 thus amuse the country gentlemen with a first-rate 
 hunt." And such fears did the poor people enter- 
 tain, lest this metamorphose should actually take 
 place, that they were only induced to let their chil- 
 dren remain at the schools by Mr. Brannigan prom- 
 ising, that if the priest turned them into hounds and 
 hares, he would restore them to the human form !* 
 You say such cases are rare — we assert they are of 
 
 * Mr. Brannigan's speech before the Irish General As- 
 sembly in 1847. 
 
124 THE GRAND CAUSE. 
 
 constant occurrence ; and we are only amazed at the 
 ignorance which at this time of day would question 
 their prevalence. Why, miracles themselves are 
 every-day events amongst us ; and what wonder, if, 
 when France is blessed with its Rose Tamisiers, and 
 Italy with its winking virgins, " Catholic Ireland" 
 should be vouchsafed some celestial manifestations 1 
 You say the priests do not attempt such things 
 in England ? What ! amongst such obstinate her- 
 etics, who would only laugh and cry delusion ! — 
 who sneer even at those miracles which Newman 
 himself has just countersigned ; and won't so much 
 as believe that St. Anthony did sail to Russia on a 
 mill-stone, and St. Denis, when decapitated, carried 
 his head in his hand for miles ! But Ireland is a 
 land of the faithful And so she is honored with 
 such miracles as the " Estatica" of Youghal, and the 
 devil cast out of men in the shape of a crow ! And 
 from Lough Derg to Groogan Barra, from Croagh 
 Patrick to Carrigaline she is covered with wells and 
 hills, over which, of course, priests are the presiding 
 geniuses, and which dispense blessings of every kind. 
 In these the blind receive their sight, the lame walk ; 
 every form of malady flies ; and when the cure fails, 
 want of faith is of course the reason. What, though 
 other lands rejoice in their protecting relics : though 
 to oblige the faithful, the angel Gabriel has given a 
 feather from his wing ; the Virgin Mary a bottle 
 of her milk ; and the blessed Saviour has so multi- 
 plied his coat, that you have one at Treves, another 
 
ROME ECLIPSES THE MIND. 125 
 
 at Home, and half-a-dozen elsewhere; and each 
 apostle has kindly left his head in so many different 
 places, that if all his heads were collected, he would 
 
 have at least as many as the great Red Dragon :* 
 
 what, though by reason doubtless of our propinquity 
 to heretic England, we are denied such blessings, 
 and have not so much as an apostolic toe-nail, or 
 rotten tooth to bow down to, — with our miracle- 
 working priests, we can manage to get on without 
 them. If our fishermen want a good fishing season, 
 they have but to send for the priest ; and for the 
 small charge of 25. for blessing a boat, and 2s. 6d. 
 for blessing a net, they may have as many miracu- 
 lous draughts as they please. When a pig or a cow 
 takes ill, let the priest be paid for saying a mass or 
 two, and if the owner has faith enough, the animal 
 is sure to recover. Nay, if you want every form of 
 goblin kept at a respectful distance, only get some 
 " holy water" or " blessed clay" from the priest ; and 
 there is not an inhabitant of the infernal world that 
 will not fly before you ! 
 
 Such are a few specimens of the teachings and 
 practices of our Irish priests. And now, we ask, 
 what can you produce worse amongst the jugglers of 
 India, or the fetish priests of Africa? Yet these 
 are but specimens — we are prepared with many as 
 bad, if challenged to produce them. To what utter 
 prostration must these men have reduced their peo- 
 ple's minds, before they could believe or tolerate 
 * Seymour's Pilgrimage to Rome. 
 
126 THE GRAND CAUSE. 
 
 such imposture ! And if Rome can so besot and 
 kill the finest mind as to have in a few years trans- 
 formed Newman himself into a devout believer in 
 her most drivelling legends, what must be the effect 
 on our countrymen of a system which thus at once 
 excludes the truth and teaches such impudent false- 
 hoods ? Or what mind could help sinking into utter 
 decrepitude when thus deprived of its proper ali- 
 ment, and fed instead on a compound of trash and 
 poison, such as never yet has failed to benight and 
 stupefy the finest race that has ever been exposed to 
 its blasting power ? 
 
 Secular Knowledge. — We have seen that Ire- 
 land does not know her alphabet, and that in every 
 parish the ignorance deepens as Rome prevails. 
 Now, the omnipotence of the priesthood is their 
 own loudest boast. Until very lately, they ruled 
 the country — the government itself was obedient to 
 their will — and from the centre of their respective 
 parishes they were virtually able to look around 
 and exclaim, " I am monarch of all I survey." 
 Then surely no one will doubt that such men, who 
 could drive their people like sheep to the hustings, 
 and through the worst of the famine keep the Re- 
 peal chest full, could have planted the country thick 
 with seminaries, and made Ireland the glory instead 
 of the shame of the age. When have they ever 
 once so employed their powers? They have not 
 been slow to wield them in other directions ; but 
 
ROME ECLIPSES THE MIND. 127 
 
 where are the libraries they have formed, or the 
 lectures they have founded? They have raised 
 millions for political objects ; how much have they 
 raised for literary ones? They have formed scores 
 of societies for agitation and mischief; point out 
 one they have ever projected for the mental improve- 
 ment of the masses ? Why, all that has ever been 
 done to elevate their own people has been effected 
 by Protestants ; and the only share the priests have 
 had in each movement, has been to give it their 
 most determined opposition. When an effort has 
 been made by industrial schools to send a few rays 
 of light into those benighted western regions, of 
 which for ages they have held undisturbed posses- 
 sion, they manifest a fury which proves but too 
 clearly how they " hate its beams," and tremble at 
 the approach of the schoolmaster. One female 
 teacher the author saw in a dangerous fever, 
 brought on by a priest entering her school, and 
 flogging the terrified children. Lately a Ballina 
 priest was prosecuted for beating a poor widow on 
 the head because her child attended an industrial 
 school : and you may see, in a late " Tyrawley 
 Herald" a long letter from his pen in defence, and 
 even laudation, of the horsewhip, as one of the 
 choicest implements of ecclesiastical discipline. 
 And when a Scotch merchant established a sim- 
 ilar school in Westport, from which the Bible was 
 wholly excluded, the priests never rested till they 
 destroyed it. National schools have been offered 
 
128 THE GRAND CAUSE. 
 
 them, giving them " complete control," yet numbers 
 have refused to accept them : many who at first 
 adopted them, did so in a great measure out of op- 
 position to those Protestant ministers who were un- 
 friendly to the National Board ; the more sagacious 
 have long seen that these schools are springing a 
 mine beneath their feet, and would gladly close 
 them if they could ; and as the best proof of this, 
 every means are employed, from the thunders of the 
 Vatican to the decrees of Thurles, to destroy those 
 Queen's Colleges, which are founded on the very 
 name principles. 
 
 You reply, there are many exceptions. Of course 
 there are ; yet, perhaps, not so many as you think. 
 Do you not observe, kind reader, that our few 
 priestly patrons of learning are chiefly found in 
 Protestant districts — that their schools are fre- 
 quently commenced after the Protestant ones, and 
 as frequently cease when, from any cause, the latter 
 are given up ; that we never heard a word of a Pop- 
 ish University till after the Queen's Colleges were 
 established ; and that some of the worst enemies 
 of our industrial schools are now establishing sim- 
 ilar ones, as the only hope left them of wiling their 
 children away from us % Yes ; and if the Ulster 
 Roman Catholic is more enlightened than his Con- 
 naught brother, think you it is Popery he has to 
 thank for it ? Can you really doubt the doom that 
 would have befallen him, had he been cradled in 
 those western regions where Popery reigns, and 
 
ROME ECLIPSES THE MIND. 129 
 
 with it mental " cliaos and old night ;" or he at any 
 loss to know what the Connaught priests would do 
 for Ulster, did they possess the power ? 
 
 But, of course, it is not in these islands, where 
 Rome's constant restlessness proves how fettered she 
 feels, that you are to look for her genuine character. 
 Go to those dominions where she " sits a queen," and 
 the prince does homage to the priest ; and where has 
 she ever gained the ascendency that her first step 
 has not been to extinguish the lights ? Go to her 
 capital, and see the vast machinery there constantly 
 employed to stifle the free utterances of mind. Be- 
 hold that " conclave of owls," the Congregation of 
 the Index, ready to pounce on every author who 
 would dare think for himself, and consign him to the 
 Inquisition for the good of his soul. 
 
 By that ghostly tribunal has the traveller's port- 
 manteau been ransacked. In their expurgatory and 
 prohibitory index, the first book proscribed is the 
 Word of God ! And while you search it in vain for 
 the vilest productions, you see in its dark catalogue 
 such matchless works as those of Locke and Bacon, 
 Addison and Hale, Cowper and Young, Mosheim 
 and Robertson ! Instructive contrast, truly, be- 
 tween Home and England ! Earth's most illustrious 
 authors the one rears and the other proscribes. 
 True, painting and sculpture have flourished under 
 Rome, and there is a good reason. Such men as 
 Raphael and Angelo were this giant enslaver's best 
 servants, by filling her cathedrals with that charm- 
 
 9 
 
130 THE GRAND CAUSE. 
 
 ing " drapery," which spell-binds the ignorant devo- 
 tee ; for none knows better than Rome how to speak 
 to the senses by the statued aisle, and the painted 
 window, and the Gothic edifice. Painting and sculp- 
 ture were therefore smiled on by Rome ; but under 
 such patronage, they have been well compared to 
 beautiful captives chained to the chariot-wheels of 
 some Ethiopian divinity.* But look to the history 
 of other sciences, and Rome has been little better 
 than their jailor. How often have her police mount- 
 ed guard at the astronomer's door, and watched even 
 the inspirations of the poet ! It was this infallible 
 church which persecuted Harvey for discovering the 
 circulation of the blood ; beat Prinella with rods for 
 saying the stars would not fall ; and seven times 
 tortured Camparella for asserting there was a mul- 
 titude of worlds. Yet this is the church which Paul 
 Cullen has had the effrontery, in his Drogheda man- 
 ifesto, to pronounce the very light and civilizer of 
 nations ! — a church which, in the name of Paul, im- 
 prisoned Columbus for saying there was a new world ; 
 and, in the name of Joshua, imprisoned Galileo for 
 the blasphemous assertion that the earth moved. 
 Why, she has been the grand impediment to the 
 world's progress. Long was medicine doomed to 
 see inoculation classed among the mortal sins ; long 
 had surgery to beware of making one heretical in- 
 cision ; spectre monks have haunted the geologist in 
 the bowels of the earth, and dogged the geographer 
 * Wylie on the Papacy. 
 
ROME ECLIPSES THE MIND. 131 
 
 on its surface : — the earth herself durst not go round 
 until she got leave from the Pope ; and had Geor- 
 gium Sidus appeared but a century sooner than he 
 did. he would no doubt have been anathematized for 
 his profane intrusion. In comparison to Rome, in- 
 fidelity is a patron of light : — the disciples of Vol- 
 taire at least think — those of t: the church" must 
 simply believe ; infidel France is a land of authors — 
 Popish Spain a land of ignorance. Mohammedan- 
 ism itself is more friendly to learning — the arts 
 flourished in Arabia, and Spain owed her greatness 
 to the Moors. Nay, even Paganism cries out against 
 the injustice of being here classed with Popery : — 
 Rome, once the seat of learning, is now its sepulchre ; 
 — the muses have long fled from their ancient Italian 
 haunts, and in every part of that classic land the stran- 
 ger meets the ruins of Pagan greatness ; and the Fo- 
 rum, which once rung with the inspirations of Tully, 
 now resounds with the babble of ignorant monks. 
 
 Such, then, is the system beneath which Ireland 
 groans, — a system which, for darkness, leaves hea- 
 thenism behind, makes the office of teacher a bur- 
 lesque on the name, and gives the infidel ground to 
 say, that the mythology of Greece or Egypt is more 
 friendly to knowledge than the religion of Jesus, and 
 that in this respect Peter can but ill compare with 
 Osiris or Olympian Jove. Surely, then, we have 
 sufficiently accounted for Ireland's ignorance. Be- 
 neath a system which has for centuries " squatted 
 like a night hag" on the energies of Europe, is it any 
 
132 THE GRAND CAUSE. 
 
 wonder she should suffer so deep an eclipse ? — a 
 system which, wherever it has swayed its sable 
 sceptre, has turned back the sunbeams of light 
 on the dials of the world ! And lest there should 
 remain the least doubt on the subject, she has her- 
 self of late been kindly doing much to help the 
 feeblest faith. Those ' : dark ages," which men blush 
 to remember, she now openly parades as the very 
 glory of history. The most peerless volumes of 
 modern times, she avows her desire to supersede 
 with the fables of mediaeval monks. Her long-buried 
 trumpery is exhumed ; her obsolete calendars are re- 
 produced ; her silliest fooleries ostentatiously parad- 
 ed ; and St. Lawrence 0' Toole is invoked in her 
 public gatherings. Yes, and it is the moment when 
 the whole world is rushing on at its highest speed, 
 amidst the blaze of the nineteenth century, that her 
 priests, like creatures of night, would choose to crawl 
 back into the dungeons of the twelfth, and are doing 
 their very utmost to drag the nations after them. 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 ROME CORRUPTS THE CONSCIENCE. 
 
 We have proved that sin must bring ruin, and 
 virtue prosperity. It was sin that blasted paradise j 
 that scathed the earth ; that burned up Sodom ; 
 
ROME CORRUPTS THE CONSCIENCE. 133 
 
 that drowned the world ; that kindled hell ; above 
 all, that crucified the Saviour. Sin is that hideous 
 thing which has turned angels into demons ; conies 
 sounding up from the depths of hell in the wailings 
 of the lost ; and could not be forgiven till the sword 
 of justice was quenched in the bosom of mercy, and 
 the Lord of glory had borne such punishment as 
 none but Omnipotence could inflict — or bear. No 
 wonder, truly, if a God all virtue should evince his 
 supreme abhorrence of a thing so dreadful ; and if 
 his entire administration should aim at its destruc- 
 tion. So to arrest this fell thing all providence and 
 grace conspire : but to spread it with all its miseries 
 is Satan's constant aim. Therefore, the religion which 
 conduces most to virtue, must most accord with the 
 laws of God and the interests of man ; while that 
 which would relax the obligations of the divine law, 
 must needs be a traitor to God, and a curse to man. 
 Now, what has been the tendency of Rome ? 
 Remember that virtue is man's normal state, and 
 vice his abnormal ; the one his healthy condition, 
 the other his disease : the one, in short, his greatest 
 blessing, and the other his greatest curse. There- 
 fore, to be abs Dived from virtue were his greatest 
 calamity, and the religion that would pretend to 
 absolve from it. must be his worst foe. And yet the 
 grand aim of Rome's theology seems to be, to get 
 rid of that intolerable burden, virtue, which forms 
 the heaven of saints and angels. 
 
134 TOE GRAND CAUSE. 
 
 Her Principles. — First, The doctrine of venial 
 sins proclaims the vast majority of man's transgres- 
 sions to be undeserving of a hell at all. A little of 
 penance or of purgatory suffices to expiate them, 
 and even these can be vastly mitigated by prayers 
 and payments. Then as to the few mortal sins 
 which remain, the transgressor need feel no uneasi- 
 ness ; for his church has provided so many facilities 
 of pardon, that not even, the vilest wretch can perish, 
 who is not bent on his own destruction. As oft as 
 he pleases he can repair to the confessional, and 
 return as pure as the virgin snow. Nor is it at the 
 confessional merely he may be cleansed ; all along 
 the road of life, fountains of purification are placed 
 at convenient distances. Scarce has he emerged 
 from the worn}), when baptism makes him an "infant 
 cherub." Confirmation in due time cleanses the 
 " sins of his youth " Every Sunday he may par- 
 take of the eucharist ; and no sooner does he swal- 
 low the " wafer-god," than his title to the skies is 
 renewed. And as his whole way through life is 
 thus carefully guarded, so at the hour of death 
 extreme unction comes ' = to lubricate his passage 
 into eternity." Nay, lest by possibility these numer- 
 ous safeguards should prove insufficient, the realms 
 of purgatory stretch away beyond the grave. More- 
 over, not only may the sinner obtain pardon for past, 
 but license for future sins. From the days of Tet- 
 zel, who made Europe an indulgence-shop, the privi- 
 lege of committing the blackest crimes has been 
 
ROME CORRUPTS THE CONSCIENCE. 135 
 
 bought at Rome's spiritual bazaar. Simon Magus, 
 in his " iniquity," thought to purchase the gift of 
 God with money ; but here Simon Peter is made to 
 leave him far behind, by selling sin itself for gold. 
 The commandments of God have been set up to 
 auction, and the luxury of breaking them sold to the 
 highest bidder. We ask, What must needs be the 
 effect of such a system, by which poor human nature 
 is not even left to its own corrupt tendencies, but 
 God himself is made to hold out premiums and 
 incentives to sin ? How is it possible for Popish 
 lands to escape being reel with crime, and foul with 
 pollution? Some wretch is tempted to do a deed 
 of blood ; while yet he hesitates, conscience remon- 
 strates, reason condemns, and the looming gibbet 
 grimly frowns on the half-formed design. But, 
 amidst this array of stern remonstrants, one kind 
 friend appears, and whispers a more accommodating 
 morality — tells him, that if man is severe, God at 
 least is indulgent, and has empowered him to par- 
 don the darkest crimes that ever judge condemned, 
 and send to heaven the foulest criminal that ever 
 justice sent to the gallows. Is this a colored pic- 
 ture? Then is all history a fable. Deeds have 
 been done beneath Rome's fostering shade, from 
 which even corrupt nature recoils ; the civil power 
 has often had to protect public virtue from the 
 ecclesiastical; and iniquity has often fled to the 
 priest for shelter from the policeman, and found a 
 sanctuary by the altar from the terrors of the bench. 
 
136 THE GRAND CAUSE. 
 
 You say the priest admonishes the confessor? — 
 what cares he for all his lectures if pardon forms 
 the closing sentence ? Now, surely this alone would 
 sufficiently account for Ireland's crowded jails and 
 loaded calendars. But lest we should wrong this 
 system, let us turn for a moment from its principles 
 to its practice. 
 
 Her Priesthood. — If there is any good in a 
 religion, it will, of course, be found in its ministers. 
 They are at once its exponents and examples. In 
 them it lives and breathes as its visible embodiment. 
 And if. in all times and places, the majority of them 
 have been good or bad, this alone stamps the charac- 
 ter of the system ; and ever must, till grapes grow 
 on thorns, and figs on thistles. Besides, it is rea- 
 sonable to think that Christ's ministers should be 
 Christ-like — that the servants of the Holy One 
 should themselves be holy — especially if their very 
 work is the spread of holiness. Would it not be 
 monstrous to suppose that the thrice-holy Jehovah, 
 " who cannot even look upon sin," would freely 
 admit its approach to his altar, and appoint, as 
 " ensamples to his flock," men who are a disgrace to 
 human nature ? Do we not find, on the contrary, 
 that his prophets and apostles were men of the 
 most heavenly minds, " full of faith and 'of the Holy 
 Ghost?" 
 
 Now, what is the character of the Irish priest ? 
 Surely he must be the purest of men who is admit- 
 
ROME CORRUPTS THE CONSCIENCE. 137 
 
 ted daily to God's inmost pavilion, to learn the 
 secrets of the invisible world ; to whom are entrust- 
 ed the keys and even the thunders of heaven; nay, 
 who multiplies at will the body, soul, and divinity 
 of his Maker. At least, of all ministers he should 
 be the most spotless. The Roman Catholic has no 
 other evidence but his word of the existence of a 
 purgatory, whether his parent is there, whether he 
 is escaping, or when he escapes ; nor no other guar- 
 antee but his faithfulness for the right performance 
 of those ceremonies on which his own eternal safety 
 hangs. All depends upon the priest ; — the divine 
 authority of the " church" on his veracity — the sal- 
 vation of the people on his fidelity. In a word, on 
 that man's single shoulders rest the tremendous 
 responsibilities which attach to the keepership of 
 the gates of heaven. Would you not expect such a 
 man to be as bright a saint as Noah, Daniel, or Job 
 — to be the very image and reflection of Christ 
 himself? Well, we have already seen a little of his 
 character — how he can handle the horsewhip, and 
 burn the Bible. And let the reader remember, 
 that of his conduct in these matters we have given 
 the most meagre samples. Such an everyday affair, 
 for instance, is priestly opposition to the Bible, that 
 if you ask the children of our mission-schools who 
 hates it most, they answer, " The devil;" and if you 
 ask, Who next to the devil, they at once reply, 
 "The priest!"* Even the American ambassador, 
 * Greg's " Visit to Erris," p. 34. 
 
138 THE GRAND CAUSE. 
 
 on his late visit of kindness, could not allude to 
 the blessings that volume had conferred on his own 
 glorious country, but forth comes a growl from St. 
 Jarlaths, and the Popish papers suppress the senti- 
 ment. 
 
 But we have other charges still to prefer. There 
 are few precepts of the decalogue with which the 
 Irish priest has not taken liberties. Profane swear- 
 ing, that lowest of vices confined to the very canaille^ 
 that vernacular of the ring and the cock-pit, is by no 
 means uncommon amongst them. One of our mis- 
 sionaries, who met a priest on a Relief committee in 
 1847, was obliged to threaten him with exposure if 
 he did not desist from blaspheming ; and never was 
 it the author's lot to listen to such a torrent of oaths 
 as Priest Timlin poured forth during the riot at 
 Ballymaciola. Yes, and though his entire conduct 
 on that occasion was the theme of every newspaper, 
 not a whisper of disapproval was ever known to be 
 breathed by priest or bishop over broad Ireland. 
 His brethren clung around him during his whole 
 trial ; and to this hour he rejoices in the undimin- 
 ished sunshine of his own diocesan's favor. 
 
 We fear we can say as little for the temperance 
 of the Irish priesthood. Indeed, the "jolly priest" 
 is a stereotyped phrase amongst us ; and the scenes 
 which are sometimes enacted amongst these rever- 
 end symposiasts, are said to be of the most extraor- 
 dinary description. On such occasions, not much 
 respect is shown for the glasses or decanters, and 
 
, — '~1 
 
 ROME CORRUPTS THE CONSCIENCE. 139 
 
 sometimes little more for each other. We have it 
 on the best authority, that a dance on the table is 
 nothing new, and that even to be under the table, is 
 by no means uncommon. Nor do they always con- 
 fine themselves to midnight convivialities ; the sun 
 often looks on their frailties ; and their flocks have 
 occasionally to help them home from a fair. In the 
 open street of Killalla, one of them in this deplora- 
 ble state got hold of the Rev. Mr. Rogers, and ac- 
 tually kissed him, as the preface to some request he 
 was going to make ! 
 
 Again, a disregard of truth has been an old fea- 
 ture of Rome. To her belongs an entire order, 
 who have " reduced scheming to a system, and wear 
 the mask by rule ;" who unblushingly avow that not 
 only truth, but every other moral obligation, must 
 yield to the " interests of the church :" and the im- 
 mortal Pascal has taught us how well they have ex- 
 emplified this iniquitous doctrine. There is not a 
 crime in the dark lists of perdition, that the " Socie- 
 ty of Jesus" have not over and over again commit- 
 ted, for the glory of God and the good of men's 
 souls ! Yet the Jesuits are Rome's best-beloved 
 agents ; and numberless bulls and decrees demon- 
 strate how generally she has practised their tenets. 
 That meanest of vices, lying, — that grand auxiliary 
 of all other vices ; of which the Devil is, by pre- 
 eminence, called " the father ;" and to be charged 
 with which even worldly men count the foulest in- 
 sult ; has been the favorite vice of the infallible 
 
140 THE GRAND CAUSE. 
 
 church. From her earliest days to this very hour, 
 when she has just absolved Joseph of Austria and 
 Ferdinand of Naples from their most solemn oaths 
 to their subjects, oaths have been but straws to 
 Rome ; she has laughed at the most sacred pledges. 
 and in almost all her standards, from the decrees of 
 the Lateran to the class-books of Maynooth, has 
 openly taught that truth must never stand in the way 
 of the " church's" interests. Here is, perhaps, the 
 worst feature of the system, indicating but too clear- 
 ly its paternity. You see it in its every doctrine — 
 enough of truth to make its lies go down with the 
 ignorant. You see it in all its practice — seldom the 
 flat lie, but one masked beneath some shuffle or quib- 
 ble, designed as a loophole in case of detection. In- 
 stance her denial, in the face of all fact, that she 
 forbids the use of the Scriptures, on the miserable 
 plea, that any one may read them who has a license 
 from his priest ! Instance the pitiful Jesuitism of 
 the Popish bishop of Clifton, in the case of Miss 
 Talbot, and of Wiseman himself, in the matter of 
 the cardinal's oath, as thoroughly exposed by Dr. 
 Cumming. Indeed, the brazen audacity with which 
 the Popish priests can put forth the grossest un- 
 truths, could scarcely be credited by those who do 
 not know them. Priest Walsh, of the glens of An- 
 trim, cursed from the altar the miller already no- 
 ticed, and several others, for acting as Irish teach- 
 ers ; and yet, immediately after, proclaimed through 
 all Scotland that there was not an Irish teacher in 
 
ROME CORRUPTS THE CONSCIENCE. 141 
 
 that whole neighborhood ! In the case of the Mil- 
 town riots, not only did the parish priest publish in 
 the papers the grossest untruths : but the attorney 
 for the defence, who himself had no peculiar inter- 
 est in the matter, sent the Cork Examiner a report 
 of the trial, containing at least fifty falsehoods, 
 and in which, besides a long speech from himself 
 which had never been spoken, he makes several wit- 
 nesses depose to the reverse of what they actually 
 did swear. Yet even these are but trifles. It is a 
 common remark in Ireland, that no Popish jury will 
 convict a Popish priest, nor Roman Catholic witness 
 testify against him ; and not much wonder, if he can 
 send them to heaven or hell at his pleasure. In the 
 trial of Priest Timlin, one unhappy wretch, when 
 being sworn, was detected putting the book to his 
 chin, in the belief that, if he could avoid kissing it, 
 he was not sworn at all. Another swore, first, that 
 he could speak no English, then, that Mr. Johnston, 
 who could speak no Irish, had a long conversation 
 with him about attending the service at Ballyma- 
 ciola ! The charge against the priest was established 
 so clearly, that the barrister, himself a Roman 
 Catholic, while charging the jury, administered to 
 him the severest castigation, assuming, as a matter 
 of course, that he would be convicted ; yet the jury, 
 in the full knowledge of all the facts before they en- 
 tered the box at all — for the outrage took place in 
 the neighborhood — at once acquitted the prisoner. 
 Nay, what is still more instructive, this was univer- 
 
142 . THE GRAND CAUSE. 
 
 sally expected before the trial commenced at all. 
 " As soon as I see who the jury are," said a Roman 
 Catholic attorney, engaged in the prosecution, to the 
 author, " I'll tell you whether you'll get a verdict ;" 
 and the instant they were sworn he whispered again, 
 " You may make up your mind you'll get no ver- 
 dict !" 
 
 It is needless here to speak of the blessings of 
 the Sabbath — that heavenly institution so worthy 
 of God and beneficial to man. It is enough to say, 
 that wherever it is abolished, true religion expires. 
 The system, therefore, that would destroy or weaken 
 its obligations deals a fatal stab to the best interests 
 of man. Yet by the priesthood of Ireland the first 
 day of the week is made the hack of the other six. 
 If there is to be any political meeting, the Sabbath 
 is preferred as being an idle day. At a great " Sun- 
 day Demonstration" held in Tipperary in 1847, 
 Archdeacon Laffan ridiculed the hypocrisy of some 
 who had sufficient conscience left to decline attending 
 on that day. And the largest procession we ever 
 beheld, got up to welcome O'Connell to Cork after 
 his victory in the State prosecutions, and reckoned 
 to contain seventy thousand individuals, took place 
 on the Lord's day, by the appointment of the priests : 
 and in order to give the entire day to it, they an- 
 nounced on the previous Sabbath, that mass usually 
 over at noon would that day end at eight in the 
 morning. We have seen a priest in Connaught 
 coolly superintending his laborers in the field on the 
 
ROME CORRUPTS THE CONSCIENCE. 143 
 
 Sabbath. And another in the same province, not 
 only publicly advertised the auction of his crops for 
 that day, but actually held a raffle in his chapel after 
 " Sunday mass, 1 ' having previously distributed lot- 
 tery tickets of which the following is a copy : — " To 
 be raffled by the Rev. Arthur O'Dwyer at Athenry, 
 on Sunday the 18th of May. 1851, a beautiful lever 
 watch. The proceeds of the raffle to go to the re- 
 pairs of the Newcastle chapel. Tickets, one shilling 
 each ! !" 
 
 So much has been said by others on priestly vio- 
 lations of the seventh commandment, that we are 
 disposed to omit that branch of our mournful sub- 
 ject. The first revealed remark ever made on man 
 by (rod was, u It is not good for man to be alone," 
 and all experience proclaims its infinite justness. 
 We cannot imagine a more satanic device than that 
 which cuts off the Romish clergy from the softening 
 and refining intercourse of woman. But if there is 
 anything in their church worse than celibacy, it is 
 the diabolic contrivance of the confessional. That 
 single device sends its blasting influence in all direc- 
 tions, and in none more fearfully than in that of the 
 priest himself. Oh, how that man is to be pitied 
 who is continually exposed to th corruptions of the 
 confession-box, and whose mind is the very cesspool 
 into which the abominations of a whole parish are 
 constantly running ! But if even one of these de- 
 vices is so dreadful, what must be the combined in- 
 fluence of both ? Think of a young, full, hot-blooded 
 
144 THE GRAND CAUSE. 
 
 priest daily encountering in his confession-box trem- 
 bling youth and beauty, perhaps some one in partic- 
 ular, the poison of whose eyes he may have uncon- 
 sciously imbibed, and whom, if he dare, he would 
 make his virtuous wife. : - 1 will suppose him a saint 
 — unable to fly, he apparently groans, sighs, recom- 
 mends himself to God ; but if he is only a man, he 
 shudders, desires, and already without knowing it, 
 perhaps he hopes. She arrives, kneels down at his 
 knees before him. whose heart palpitates. You are 
 young, or you have been so ; between ourselves, 
 what do you think of such a situation ? Alone most 
 of the time, and having these walls, these vaulted 
 roofs as sole witnesses, they talk — of what ? Alas, 
 of all that is not innocent. They talk or rather 
 murmur in low voice, and their lips approach each 
 other, and their breaths mingle. This lasts for an 
 hour or more, and is often renewed."* And the 
 subject of conversation, such as could not elsewhere 
 be hinted at ! The priest bound to put suggestive 
 questions enough to pollute even angelic purity, and 
 the penitent bound to answer them ; the Romish 
 doctors having ruled that concealment from a motive 
 "so vain" as modesty " would be sacrilege."! All 
 
 * Paul Lewis Oourrier. 
 
 f Not only Dens but Delahogue an<l Bailly, MaytwotJi's 
 
 recognized class-books contain questions so execrable that 
 no man of the least delicacy couM repeat {hem. Dens, 
 vols, i, iv.. vii., passim; Bailly. ii. pp. 228 229. iv. p. 48-3; 
 Delahogue, Tract. De Pen., pp. 164. 169. 
 
ROME CORRUPTS THE CONSCIENCE. 145 
 
 this done in the name of holiness ! Why, to say 
 that corrupt nature could stand such an ordeal, out- 
 rages common sense. To say that it has done so 
 belies all history. From the pontiff to the coadju- 
 tor, the priesthood of Rome have in all ages revelled 
 in debauchery. The Vatican has been turned into a 
 seraglio : and as for the humble cure, his flock has 
 often compelled him to live in concubinage as a pro- 
 tection to society ! While nunneries — those " sacred 
 retreats" from which, according to M'Hale, " the 
 odor of sanctity and virtue is diffused" — have ever 
 been such scenes of pollution, that even so late as 
 1845. Mr. Seymour found that four nuns were en- 
 ceinte in one convent at Rome.* Can we imagine 
 then, that the Irish priest, his brethren's equal in all 
 other vices, should be their superior in this alone 7 
 Alas, despite a system of secrecy fearfully perfect, 
 their impurity too often transpires. But for the 
 sake of a country which, notwithstanding their cor- 
 rupting influence, still bears a high character for 
 chastity, we refuse to lift the veil. 
 
 In truth, we are weary of the subject, and shall 
 only add. that on the Irish priesthood are directly 
 chargeable many of those outrages which disgrace 
 our country. Many a man besides Major Mahon 
 has proved 'the victim of altar harangues ; and while 
 the wretched dupes of priestly instigation have per- 
 ished on the scaffold, and now sleep in the grave of 
 infamy, those who in heaven's eyes are the real mur- 
 
 * Pilgrimage to Rome, p. 187. 
 10 
 
146 THE GRAND CAUSE. 
 
 derers still walk at large and disturb the country. 
 Our missionaries are often obliged to prosecute their 
 poor dupes for outrage ; and yet while doing so, are 
 painfully sensible that they are not touching the 
 real culprits ; they feel the presence of the priest 
 like the great tempter in every scene of riot they 
 encounter, yet like him he is invisible and eludes 
 their grasp ! Keeping always out of " shot range" 
 himself, his part is to instigate — that of his flock to 
 do and suffer. Instance the abortive rebellion of 
 1848. For with all their zeal, the Irish priests have 
 never shown much taste for fines and imprisonments, 
 and seem in no wise ambitious for the honors of 
 martyrdom. Assassination itself, they have all but 
 lauded. Archdeacon Laffan, in the meeting afore- 
 mentioned, pronounced " John Bull" too great a 
 coward to shoot a man from behind a hedge ; and 
 when the altar denunciations of '47 became so fre- 
 quent as to engage the attention of parliament, and 
 draw forth some letters to M/Hale from English 
 noblemen, he not only defended his priests in char- 
 acteristic terms, but called on one of the writers to 
 put on sackcloth for daring to interfere, and to " weep 
 between the porch and the altar." Now, who that 
 considers the power of the priesthood can wonder at 
 the crimes which follow such conduct, or doubt that 
 if they so pleased our country would enjoy tranquil- 
 lity 1 It was in this full conviction that when, in 
 the above-mentioned year, a certain district began to 
 be disturbed, some of the people met and resolved, 
 
ROME CORRUPTS THE CONSCIENCE. 147 
 
 that if any belonging to it was shot, they would shoot 
 the priest by way of reprisal. The effect was sur- 
 prising. No more thunder pealed from the altar — 
 no more threatening letters reached the post-office 
 — the happiest change seemed to have come over 
 priest and people — and tranquillity reigned in the 
 parish ! 
 
 Such, then, is a brief sketch of the Irish priest- 
 hood. We have no doubt its correctness will be 
 impugned : but this will only be an additional proof 
 of our charge, that Rome will deny anything when it 
 suits her purpose. In ignorant circles, her priests 
 have been known to deny the existence of the Inqui- 
 sition, and to pronounce the Bartholomew massacre 
 a vile slander. Doubtless many of the Irish priests 
 are moral men, especially in Protestant districts ; 
 for Rome distributes her troops with consummate 
 skill ; and as she has ever had her Murray s for the 
 court, and her M'Hales for the mob, so has she al- 
 ways assigned her more upright priests to the Prot- 
 estant localities, and those of more dubious charac- 
 ter to the Popish. But to the foregoing statements 
 we defy contradiction, and none know this better 
 than themselves. Why should this sketch be deemed 
 incorrect? Are the priesthood of any other land 
 much better ; and are they not ivorse where the 
 shade of Popery is the deepest % Rome, its capital, 
 has ever been a den of priestly corruption, and the 
 " Vicars of Christ" have been foremost in guilt. 
 Baronius, himself a cardinal, declares that they 
 
148 THE GRAND CAUSE. 
 
 " were not pontiffs, but monsters ;" and proves the 
 charge by facts with which we must not pollute our 
 pages. In the " church's" palmiest days, the priests 
 enjoyed exemption from the dominion of the laws, 
 and verily they required it ; for crimes that would 
 shock the modern criminal daily stained their hands ; 
 while such monsters as Alexander VI. and Caesar 
 Borgia made the palace of the pontiffs a sink of 
 abomination, in which incest, sodomy, and murder 
 were of frequent occurrence. 
 
 The People. — If such are the pastors, what must 
 be their flocks ? No stream rises higher than its 
 fountain : and the inspired aphorism, " Like people 
 like priest," is sustained by all experience. Indeed, 
 it is pre-eminently true of the Church of Rome ; for 
 while in other churches the pastor is only one instru- 
 ment of grace, in her he is its sole dispenser — the 
 only channel of the waters of life ; and if that chan- 
 nel is poisoned, his flock have no chance of escape. 
 In our chapter on Ireland's Moral State, we have 
 seen how sadly this is verified in her case. And will 
 the kind reader pardon us if, for the sake of a people 
 who have so long borne the blame which should have 
 rested on their blind guides, we decline returning to 
 the subject, farther than by giving two examples — 
 the one of the frequency, the other of the atrocity, 
 of crime amongst us ? He will remember that the 
 district of Cashel is amongst the most Popish in 
 Ireland. A few years ago, the following paragraph 
 
ROME CORRUPTS THE CONSCIENCE. 149 
 
 appeared in the papers under the usual heading, 
 " State of the Country:" — "'The Cashel Bench of 
 Magistrates. — The following have been the gentle- 
 men who, within the last few years, usually attended 
 this bench : — R. Long, father shot, himself twice 
 fired at ; W. Murphy, father shot ; S. Cooper 
 brother shot : Leonard Keatinge, nephew of Mr. 
 Scully, shot ; E. Scully, cousin of Mr. Scully, shot ; 
 Godfrey Taylor, cousin, Mr. Clarke, shot ; William 
 * Rowe, shot : C. Clark, brother shot ; nephew, Mr. 
 Rowe, shot !" Again, amongst the cases tried by 
 the special commission of 1847, was that of a party 
 who went to the house of a man named Hourigan, in 
 order to shoot him. He was absent ; but the ruf- 
 fians, instead of retiring and waiting for another op- 
 portunit}', shot his wife dead in the kitchen. A child 
 lay dying in the room : they entered, dragged him 
 out of bed, held him up against the wall, and — un- 
 moved by the pleadings of terror, unsoftened by the 
 pallor of sickness, unawed by the presence of death 
 — they presented a pistol, and shot him dead on the 
 spot ! ! 
 
 Perhaps you say, such wretches, though professed 
 Roman Catholics, were without the pale of their 
 church. Suppose we granted this, it would ©nly 
 prove what all history confirms, that there is a point 
 in Rome's demoralizing course at which she loses 
 hold of her own votaries — that in her dreadful pro- 
 cess of social putrefaction there is a stage at which 
 portion after portion sloughs and comes off. The 
 
150 THE GRAND CAUSE. 
 
 brigands and strirri that infest the towns and moun- 
 tains of Italy herself are terrible proofs of this truth. 
 But we cannot grant even this supposition, for 
 crimes have been sometimes concocted on the way 
 from the chapel. Nay, devotion and murder have 
 occasionally so closely followed each other, that, like 
 the Thug of India, the assassin has prepared for the 
 deed by repairing to the altar, and, as Mr. Nolan 
 has proved, often confessed to the priest the medi- 
 tated crime, and thence departed to commit it ; and 
 to crown all, the priest's vow of secrecy has hindered 
 him from giving the doomed victim the least inti- 
 mation of his danger.* Besides, it is notorious that 
 most of all our petty offences — larcenies, for instance 
 — are the work of mass-going Roman Catholics, and 
 are duly confessed to the priest ; yet, though we are 
 told Rome always requires the penitent to restore the 
 stolen property, how few cases of restitution are ever 
 heard of amongst thousands of cases of theft ! The 
 only parties who seem to profit by the trade, are 
 the thief who steals an 4 the priest who forgives him. 
 Such are the moral fruits of Popery ! Hedged 
 round with malign influences, — kept in such igno- 
 rance that many of their sins they do not even know 
 to be such, you would say vice was with our country- 
 men a thing of moral necessity. And can it be 
 equity to assert the ; ' majesty of British law" on such 
 degraded creatures, and pass by the men who are 
 
 * See several fearful cases of this kind in Rev L. J. 
 Nolan's pamphlet. Dublin : 1838. 
 
 _J 
 
ROME DESTROYS THE HEART. 151 
 
 chargeable with this degradation ? Oh, one would 
 think mere humanity would hasten to the rescue of 
 a people so trampled beneath the feet of the Beast. 
 The wail of the emigrant who is torn from his home 
 appeals to Christian pity against it. Every bugle 
 that sounds from its hundred barracks tells heaven 
 and earth of the ruin it has wrought. The blood 
 alike of murdered and murderer cries to heaven for 
 vengeance on it. The dying groans of multitudes, 
 as they rise on the wintry winds, tell of its dreadful 
 havoc. The throes of an expiring country bear aw- 
 ful testimony to its deadly venom. And, oh, what 
 thousands of ruined souls will rise up in judgment 
 against it at the last ! 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 ROME DESTROYS THE HEART. 
 
 Man has a heart ; and what a dismal world it 
 would be if he had not ! Now, mark how wonder- 
 fully the God who made it adapts his laws to it, or 
 rather it to them. " God is love." and his religion 
 is love. Its grand theme is — " God so loved the 
 world," &c. Its divine founder is the loving Sav- 
 iour, " who loved us, and gave himself for us." Its 
 great command is — love one another ; and its heav- 
 enly influence such, that none can fully practise it 
 without becoming angels of kindness. On the 
 
152 THE GRAND CAUSE. 
 
 other hand, all false systems are cruel as their 
 author. Their gods are demons ; their rites often 
 tortures ; their priests oppressors : their arguments, 
 the sword : while their code often teaches men to 
 expiate their crimes by crimes still greater, and 
 their dark domains are " full of the habitations of 
 cruelty." 
 
 If, therefore, we find that Rome withers the 
 heart ; if, instead of inspiring love, she has rather 
 proved its very sepulchre, mingling blood itself with 
 her sacrifices ; if hers is a god who delights in the 
 pilgrim's blistered feet and bleedin'g knees, a service 
 which has borrowed many of the tortures of pagan- 
 ism, and a spirit which transforms men, not only 
 stones, but demons — then again is she convicted as 
 the enemy of Grod and man. 
 
 Love to Gtod. — Love to God is the " first com- 
 mandment ;" that church therefore cannot be His 
 which makes it not her first object. Now, a very 
 simple test of a church's real spirit, is her treatment 
 of His " means of grace :" instance the Bible — the 
 Sabbath — and prayer. The child, in proportion as 
 he loves his parent, will of course love to hear from 
 him, to visit him, and to linger in his presence. 
 Well, we have seen how Rome treats the Divine 
 Word. So frequent are her Bible burnings, that 
 almost every paper gives some fresh instances. In 
 the " Mayo Constitution" of the 25th November, 
 1851, the Rev. Mr. Townsend of Ballyovee, re- 
 
ROME DESTROYS THE HEART. 153 
 
 ports the burning of two Testaments in his own 
 presence by a monk, and adds, that " the ruffian 
 thrust the burning book into Ins face, triumphing 
 over his dark deed of iniquity, and calling it a 
 ' damnable' and ' heretical' book." The Bible ! that 
 divine message of love from our Father in the skies, 
 pored over by thousands with tears of ecstasy ! Oh, 
 fancy a son hunting like a demon for his father's let- 
 ters, then making a bonfire of them, raving the while 
 against all who dare murmur disapproval, and yet 
 pretending to love that father ! 
 
 We have also seen how Rome treats the Sabbath. 
 That blessed day, so ardently loved by every true 
 saint, is to her so irksome that she cannot even pay 
 it a decent outward respect. It is to her such a 
 bore, that it is generally over by noon, — that is, 
 when the mass is concluded, — and the remainder of 
 the day is given up to amusement. In purely Pop- 
 ish countries, the evening is spent in fetes and the- 
 atricals ; in our own, often in dancing and card- 
 playing — the priests themselves mingling in the 
 scene. And one of them who was lately rebuked 
 for this profanation, coolly replied, that rest and 
 recreation were the very design of that day, and a 
 " little innocent amusement" he saw no harm in ! 
 Was there ever clearer proof of Rome's spirit than 
 this 1 The wicked say, " When will the Sabbath be 
 gone?" the believer says, " When will it return 1 ?" 
 and each following his tastes, spends it, the one in 
 his Father's service, and the other in his. Yet 
 
154 THE GRAND CAUSE. 
 
 here is a K church of ' God" wliicli has ever take i 
 the lead in the ranks of Sabbath-breakers. 
 
 Take one other example. Prayer, the saint's <i< i - 
 light. is Rome's most usual penance. At every con- 
 fession prayers arc dealt out by Papal Rome, as 
 stripes used to be by Rome Pagan, in tens, twenties, 
 thirties, and with a similar object. So that you will 
 see thousands of penitents rhyming over their paters 
 and aves with all possible speed, as though trying 
 how soon they could get done with the task ; and 
 that they may not utter one prayer beyond the pre- 
 scribed number, keeping the exact " count" upon 
 their beads — an invention contrived for this very 
 purpose. Communion with God, then, is the pen- 
 ance of Rome : and it is this feeling of penance — 
 itself a sin most monstrous — which is designed as 
 satisfaction for all other sins ! Only fancy a child 
 deeming converse with his parent his greatest pun- 
 ishment, and counting this dreadfully unnatural feel- 
 ing a merit in his parent's eyes ! 
 
 Then it is a system of merchandise as well as 
 slavery. That God who gives everything; "who 
 gave his only begotten Son," " without money and 
 without price," and commands his ministers " freely 
 to give as they have freely received." is represented 
 as making his own house a " house of merchandise," 
 and giving nothing without a quid pro quo. Salva- 
 tion itself is made a system of traffic, in which gold 
 is the currency, grace the commodity, the altar the 
 shop, and the priest the salesman. For to Rome 
 
ROME DESTROYS THE HEART. 155 
 
 belongs the glory of the discovery, that in heaven as 
 ou earth. ■■ money answereth all tilings." Without 
 u you need expect little, but with it men have got 
 indulgences to murder their own parents; and so ac- 
 customed are the people to pay it on all occasions, 
 that they have sometimes asked our missionaries 
 when about to pray with them — - But, sir, what will 
 you charge us?" When a chapel is to be repaired, 
 the gates are often shut on the Sunday morning 
 with sentinels stationed at them, and none allowed 
 to enter who do not first pay ; the priest himself 
 perhaps superintending the scene with cudgel in 
 hand, and freely employing it against such as would 
 pass without contributing.* At baptisms, the priest 
 receives from 25. 6c?. to 5s.; at weddings, from £1 
 to £20 ; and often as much at each funeral for mass- 
 es for the soul of the departed. In these cases a 
 plate goes round, the priest often accompanying it ; 
 if each contributor gives not according to his sup- 
 posed means, he is often most liberally abused ; and 
 so shameful are the scenes of this nature, which are 
 frequently enacted at the very grave, that they have 
 by the vulgar been called " canting the corpse." In 
 short, be the service what it may, whether at the 
 baptismal font, the hymeneal altar, the dying bed, or 
 the gloomy grave, the horseleech is there, crying, 
 "Give, give." On every mile of the road of life 
 there is a toll-gate, ay, and beyond it too. As has 
 
 * Mr. Inglis was eye-witness to a scene of this very de- 
 scription in Cahir. (See Tour, 1834.) 
 
156 THE GRAND CAUSE. 
 
 been truly said, their people pay for coming into the 
 world, pay for passing through it, pay* for goiug out 
 of it, and pay after they leave it ! And so lucrative 
 is this last device alone to an avaricious priesthood, 
 that purgatory has been sarcastically termed, " the 
 fire that makes their pot boil." Oh, Simon Magus 
 was discovered to be " in the gall of bitterness" for 
 " supposing that the gift of God could be purchased 
 with money," but here are professed successors of 
 the apostle who detected him, who will not part with 
 it except for money 1 The spirit of Christian love 
 prompts even the layman to " do good to all as he 
 has opportunity," but here are ministers who disre- 
 gard such opportunities as are not golden ones. 
 Dear reader, do you doubt the truth of this charge ? 
 We can hardly wonder that you do ; and yet, alas ! 
 it is too well sustained. The present wonderful 
 openings in Connaught were in some measure caused 
 by this very circumstance ; for, during the famine, 
 the priests, in numbers of cases, would not take the 
 trouble of crossing a few fields to anoint the dying, 
 because they had no money to pay them ! And this 
 is the religion of the Grod of love ! Why, humanity 
 would frown the wretch out of society who would 
 refuse to save a drowning man unless paid for his 
 trouble ; but here are men, who profess to be able 
 to save souls to any extent, yet will let them perish 
 to any extent unless their purse is replenished by the 
 transaction, and who thus prove themselves impos- 
 
ROME DESTROYS THE HEART. 157 
 
 tors, who do not believe in their own masses, or 
 wretches who will not offer them. 
 
 Once more, it is a religion of cruelty ; proceeding 
 throughout on the assumption that God demands, 
 not the sanctification, but the sacrifice, of the nature 
 he has given us. and representing him as delighting 
 in such tortures as are presented to Juggernaut or 
 Kali. With Rome the degree of sanctity is always 
 measured by that of voluntary suffering ; and she 
 holds up to our admiration such devotees as Hard- 
 wigg of Poland and Margaret of Hungary, because 
 they so mangled their bodies that ' ; they could scarce 
 be recognized." Read the lives of her saints ; see 
 how the biographer kindles into ecstacy as he tells 
 you how one mangled his body with scourges, an- 
 other rolled himself in thorns, a third nailed himself 
 on a cross, and a fourth burned himself in the fire. 
 Or visit some of her holiest scenes of devotion — 
 Lough Derg. for example. See that group of pil- 
 grims approaching it ; it is a bright autumn after- 
 noon, but there is a gloom on their brow, strangely 
 contrasting with the sunshine around them — say, is 
 it the spirit of him who exclaimed, ' : I joyed when 
 they said unto me, Let us go unto the house of 
 God ?" They approach that dismal lake, surrounded 
 with dreary bogs, and selected with Rome's usual 
 skill to impress the mind with gloom. Arrived at 
 that stygian water, they are ferried across to Station 
 Island, and there undergo a course of self-inflictions, 
 not much exceeded at the island of Gonga Sago'r. 
 
158 THE GRAND CAUSE 
 
 And is this the sweet service of the God of love? 
 Think you that poor devotee, who has finished his 
 last round at Patrick's Purgatory, with his clothes 
 all torn and draggled, his knees all cut and bleeding, 
 can dream that that Saviour, who delights in this un- 
 meaning torture, is the same with him who yearned 
 over the widow of Nam, and wept by the grave of 
 Lazarus ? And vet even tins is little ; he is taught 
 that this same Saviour has prepared for him another 
 purgatory, of which Patrick's is a feeble type : where, 
 according to the best authorities, some are transfixed 
 with red-hot nails, others lashed by devils with 
 dreadful whips, others gnawed by fiery serpents with 
 ignited teeth, others pierced with the flaming stings 
 of burning serpents, and others still shot out of 
 belching volcanoes, and received back into their 
 burning craters, to be shot out again and again ! ! 
 Such a saviour he may dread ; Ave ask, can he pos- 
 sibly lore him ? Oh, what a hideous caricature of 
 that blessed Emmanuel, who suffered in our stead ! 
 Yet to these torments he consigns his own children 
 for those transgressions which, but for his own licen- 
 ses to sin, they might never have committed ! ay, 
 and the period of their torment there he makes to 
 depend much on the length of their purse. The 
 poor may burn on in those flames — the rich may es- 
 cape in a month. Their priests could pray them all 
 out, but will not, unless paid for it, and that by 
 Christ's command ! ! And yet you wonder, reader, 
 at^the irreligion of our hapless countrymen, to whom 
 
ROME DESTROYS THE HEART. 159 
 
 the God oflove is thus presented as the God of cru- 
 elty — the heavenly countenance of the Prince of 
 Peace distorted into the face of a demon — the Sun 
 of Righteousness overspread with the lurid hue of 
 an eclipse — and by the same act. the glorious cross 
 veiled from their trembling gaze and such purgato- 
 rial horrors presented in its stead. 
 
 Love to Man. — The religion of Jesus makes us 
 kind. To use the words of the prophet, it turns 
 the wolf into the lamb. Shedding its kindly in- 
 fluences over the whole face of society, it stills the 
 stormiest elements of life ; and makes the flowers of 
 social happiness, so often laid prostrate by the tem- 
 pests of human passion, to raise their drooping heads 
 and exhale a sweeter perfume. And even War, 
 that cursed demon that Christianity is destined ulti- 
 mately to destroy, it meantime half disarms : distils 
 some drops of mercy into the poisoned cup he holds ; 
 and half quenches the firebrands he flings around. 
 In a word, beneath its heavenly sway hearts cease 
 to bleed, and tears to fall ; a thousand streams of 
 relief flow, as if by enchantment, through the haunts 
 of misery ; and the downcast mourner looks up and 
 smiles. 
 
 Has this been the influence of Rome — that church 
 which trusts so much to her -• good works," and keeps 
 a treasury of supererogatory grace ? Alas ! she has 
 done less to relieve human wretchedness, and more 
 to create it. than all the other churches in Christen- 
 
160 THE GRAND CAUSE. 
 
 dom ; and while we find within her bosom a Bonner, 
 a Beaton, a Cortez, and an Alva, in vain do we search 
 for a Clarkson, a Wilberforce, or a Howard. 
 
 The same spirit of cruelty which fancies the Most 
 High to take pleasure in tortures, is exhibited even 
 to the lower creation. We refer not merely to the 
 bull-baiting scenes of Popish Spain, which even 
 Andalusian ladies delight to visit : we would only 
 ask you to examine the torn backs of the donkeys 
 and horses at any of our southern fairs, and then 
 attempt if you dare to enforce the act against cruelty 
 to animals. Nor is this want of feeling less displayed 
 by the children of Rome in their dealings with one 
 another. Roman Catholic servants will generally 
 tell you that they prefer Protestant masters to those 
 of their own persuasion, and assign the reason that 
 they are kinder to them when in health, and far 
 more tender in sickness. Ask their own poor 
 whether they get most relief from Protestant or 
 Roman Catholic. — from the parson or the priest? 
 Often have we ourselves asked them why they do 
 not go to their own clergyman for alms, and been 
 answered, " God help us, we need not go to him." 
 We have made careful inquiry at some of the prin- 
 cipal hospitals in Ireland, and the results have in 
 this respect proved truly instructive. In the north 
 and south infirmaries of Cork, the vast majority of 
 the inmates are Roman Catholics, and of the con- 
 tributors, Protestants, in proportion to their respec- 
 tive populations in the city and county: while one 
 
ROME DESTROYS THE HEART. 161 
 
 of the directors of the Belfast Hospital lately char- 
 acterized it as "a Protestant Hospital for Roman 
 Catholic inmates." It is in vain to attempt to 
 ascribe this difference in any respect to recent 
 calamities, for it has always existed. In 1834, Mr. 
 Inglis found 2 145 persons on the books of the Dub- 
 lin Mendicity Soeiety House, of whom only 200 
 were Protestants; and though the vast majority of 
 the inhabitants of that city are Roman Catholics, 
 he states, that for every pound subscribed by them, 
 there were £50 subscribed by Protestants. It is 
 equally vain to plead that Roman Catholics are 
 usually poor — if the church of Rome so impover- 
 ishes a people as to make them a public burden, is 
 she not all the more bound to give them what relief 
 she herself can afford ? Yet. even during the period 
 of the famine, when every drain of selfishness should 
 surely have been stopped to swell the streams of 
 charity, the vast proportion of the relieved were 
 Roman Catholics, and of the relieving. Protestants ; 
 and while the Protestant laborers of Ulster and 
 Britain were sending their wages to the famished 
 south, it was the topic of public remark, that balls 
 and entertainments were going on as usual in several 
 southern towns though paupers were nightly dying 
 in their street:; ! 
 
 We have already shown how little the priests seem 
 to comprehend the Divine aphorism, " It is more 
 blessed to give than to receive :" but the cases of 
 extortion we have noticed are such as are sanctioned 
 
 11 
 
162 THE GRAND CAUSE. 
 
 by the church. Sometimes, however, the priests 
 carry on a little spiritual foraging on their own au- 
 thority. Even in Ulster, we have often seen the 
 small farmers driving to the priests haggard their 
 half-load of corn, under the name of the " priest's 
 stook." In Connaught, a similar tax is levied, called 
 the " priest's ' bart. 1 " At the various " stations" for 
 confession which are held in different parts of each 
 parish, a " treat," as it is termed, must be given to 
 the priest ; and the poor people have been known to 
 sell their pig, in order thus to entertain him ! Such 
 a burden is this felt, that if any of the flock are sus- 
 pected of Bible-reading, or other heretical practices, 
 he often, by way of punishment, appoints stations at 
 their houses : and so intolerable has the custom 
 grown of late, that in some dioceses, a breakfast has, 
 by the bishop's orders, been substituted for a dinner ; 
 while owing, doubtless, to the waning influence of 
 the priests, the Synod of Thurles has found it ne- 
 cessary to discountenaDce the practice altogether. 
 During the late famine — when the Hindoos of Cal- 
 cutta and the Copts of Alexandria were sending re- 
 lief to Ireland — its own priests, in many cases, not 
 only left the people to perish, but robbed them of 
 the alms bestowed by heathen and Mohammedan 
 charity. One priest made large sums by selling 
 holy salt to cure the potato disease, and many gave 
 their last sixpence to purchase this specific ; others 
 sold the relief-tickets with which they were intrust- 
 ed for gratuitous distribution ; while several gave 
 
ROME DESTROYS THE HEART. 163 
 
 them to the people on condition that the first relief 
 procured should be brought to them, as payment of 
 arrear-dues !* Of some, it was reported that they 
 never gave a satisfactory account of the relief which 
 was entrusted to their care ; and such currency did 
 these rumors gain, that those who had first entrust- 
 ed them therewith, soon thought it better to com- 
 mit it to other hands. And Dr. MHale himself, 
 while appealing through the papers to public sym- 
 pathy on behalf of the starving masses around him, 
 was convicted by the relieving officer as a defaulter 
 in the payment of his own poor-rates ! The author, 
 while in Connaught in the winter of 1848. was as 
 much struck with the fulness of the priests' haggards 
 as with the emptiness of their people's ; and, as an 
 explanation of the phenomenon, a brother mission- 
 ary related the following anecdote : — In the neigh- 
 borhood of Westport, dwelt a poor man who sup- 
 ported a family on five acres of land. When the 
 potato failed in 1847, his all was destroyed, save a 
 small patch of oats, which amounted, when reaped, 
 to sixty sheaves. The priest came round for his 
 " bart." The wretched man pointed imploringly to 
 his wife and family. You say, surely the priest gave 
 him something : at least, it is impossible he could 
 have asked him for anything ; and, for the sake of 
 our common humanity, one would fain so believe. 
 But, deaf to every entreaty, dead to every feeling, 
 he commanded his servant to count into his cart 
 
 * Ireland in 1846, pp. 174-176. 
 
164 THE GRAND CAUSE. 
 
 20 sheaves of the 60, and then he marched off with 
 his booty ! ! Yet these men. who have only them- 
 selves to support, are the professed ministers of Him 
 who " was rich, yet for our sakes became poor." and 
 from his great tribunal will proclaim to the wicked, 
 " I was an hungered, and ye gave me no meat," &c. 
 No wonder the remark should be common amongst 
 their flocks, that " a priest's money never wears weUV 
 Yet this is the system which purchases heaven by 
 liberality and love— has whole orders bearing such 
 musical names as ' : Christian Brothers" and ' : Sisters 
 of Mercy" — and especially boasts its convents as 
 sanctuaries of heavenly charity ! Well, we shall 
 presently take a peep into these sacred retreats, and 
 shall only now remind the reader, that such cases as 
 those of Miss Talbot, the Misses M'Carthy, and 
 Maria Monk, show that, within the abodes of celes- 
 tial love, there is pretty frequently betrayed a hank- 
 ering for the gold that perisheth, — ay, and various 
 ot/ier passions of a terrestrial type ! 
 
 Yet this is but lingering on the threshold of our 
 theme. If you wish to see the inmost soul of Rome, 
 consult the records of persecution. The only weapon 
 Christianity knows, is the " truth in love." Besides, 
 its Author knows that mind may be convinced, but 
 cannot be coerced : that force may make hypocrites, 
 but never true Christians ; that the heart can only 
 be won by kindness, and to attempt to force affection, 
 is only to create disgust. Two individuals compete 
 for your heart ; one of them imprisons, tortures, 
 
ROME DESTROYS THE HEART. 165 
 
 burns you ; you can scarce help abhorring him. The 
 other yearns over you. showers kindness on you, lives 
 for you, dies for you : can you refrain from loving 
 him 1 As acts the latter, so acts Christ — according 
 to the laws of God and of our nature. As acts the 
 former, so does Rome — these laws seem to give her 
 small concern. We will not insult the reader by 
 proving, for the thousandth time, that her tenets are 
 persecuting. We wonder why others are at so much 
 pains to do this, because, forsooth, Rome denies it. 
 We look to her whole career, their best commentary, 
 and find it to be one of blood. The boot and thumb- 
 screw have been her favorite arguments ; and, as a 
 living writer has calculated, she has shed more holy 
 blood than all the gibbets on earth have shed of 
 felon blood ! Look to the Irish massacre of 1641, 
 planned by the priests in Multifarnhan Abbey, in 
 which 60.000 Protestants perished amidst their mur- 
 derers' exulting yells.* Witness the rebellion of 
 1 798, which, at first wearing a political aspect, soon 
 became in many parts little else than a butchery of 
 Protestants, under the direction of the priesthood. 
 Or look to other lands ; and is there a country in 
 Europe whose soil has not been fattened with the 
 blood, whose air has not been rent with the groans 
 of Rome's victims ? Pope Julius caused, in seven 
 years, the slaughter of 200.000 Christians; 100,000 
 fell in the Bartholomew massacre; 100,000 in the' 
 butcheries of the Waldenses and Albigenses j 
 
 * Some say 100,000. 
 
166 THE GRAND CAUSE. 
 
 1,500,000 Jews, and 3.000 000 of Moors, were 
 slaughtered in Spain ; 15 000.000 in South America 
 and Cuba ; while the cold-blooded butcheries of the 
 Dutch by the Duke of Alva, of the English by 
 Bloody Mary, and of the Spanish and Italians by 
 the " Holy Inquisition," are familiar to all our 
 readers. The latter infernal tribunal has destroyed, 
 in Spain alone, 2,000,000 of lives ; # while Rome 
 is calculated to have shed, in all, the blood of 
 68,000,000 of the human race ! ! 
 
 Yet this brief summary gives no such conceptions 
 of the character of Rome, as the circumstances under 
 which these butcheries were eifected. You see her 
 popes and cardinals coolly plotting the extermination 
 of whole countries, and then chanting Te Deums 
 when their schemes have succeeded : and you see 
 them executing their plots with a refinement of 
 cruelty, of which only hell seemed capable. Who 
 can read of the engines of torture by which myriads 
 were tormented in the dungeons of the Inquisition, 
 without fancying himself in the prisons of the damned, 
 and surrounded by the fiends of perdition ? Yet 
 these horrors were matters of jest to the inquisitors 
 themselves. " Give me a Jew," said Azzerro, the in- 
 quisitorial butcher of Cordova, " and I will show you 
 in my crucible a residuum of ashes !" And the most 
 revolting feature of the case is, that these atrocities 
 have all been perpetrated in the name of Jesus, and 
 for the love of God ! The female martyr, whilst 
 * Llonnks' History of the Inquisition. 
 
ROME DESTROYS THE HEART. 167 
 
 being torn to pieces by these monsters, was ever and 
 anon greeted with these words, — u Beloved sister, re- 
 cant." Heaven's blessing has been invoked on their 
 most shocking butcheries, and their victim's groans 
 have been drowned by their chants and hallelujahs. 
 When the edict of Nantes was revoked in the face 
 of the most solemn oaths, thereby effecting the ruin 
 of myriads, a hoary-headed wretch exclaimed, " Lord, 
 now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace, for mine 
 eyes have seen thy salvation ! !" Yes. in the name 
 of Religion deeds have been done at which human- 
 ity shudders ; and the rude soldier lias wept over 
 the innocents his priest has forced him to slaughter. 
 And such a system of blood you must believe to be 
 divine, such fiendish cruelty to spring from heavenly 
 love, and deeds that would disgrace the bloodiest 
 idol, we must father on the meek and gentle Jesus ! 
 Oh. think of that •• Lamb of God" careering through 
 the world with a sword in one hand, and a crucifix 
 in the other : followed by a train of inquisitors, bear- 
 ing such instruments of torture as Indians never 
 dreamt of! ! 
 
 You say she is changed ? Then produce the man 
 who has heard her lamentations over the holy blood 
 smc has shed. Changed ! What blood} 7 decree has 
 been known to revoke — what fiendish butchery 
 to deplore? Were we not told the other day by her 
 own organ. U Univers. that another Bartholomew 
 massacre had now become necessary ? Changed ! 
 Witness in proof the scenes of Madeira and those of 
 
168 THE GRAND CAUSE. 
 
 Tahiti — Tahiti, that little isle in the distant Pacific, 
 transformed by gospel missionaries from an island 
 of savages to one of saints, Rome beheld from afar, 
 like Satan eyeing Paradise, and never ceased her in- 
 trigues till it lay torn and bleeding at her feet, 
 Changed ! Witness the Inquisition at Rome, un- 
 veiled by the revolution of 1849 to the gaze and 
 execration of Europe, with its eoncealed traps, deep 
 wells, quick-lime pits. &c. : and which was restored 
 to its ancient vigor the instant the Pope returned. 
 There is a change, we own, from the tiger in the for- 
 est to the tiger in the cage ; but he must be judi- 
 cially blind, who does not see, from all her late pro- 
 ceedings, that she only wants the power in order to 
 bring back the days of Smithfield. Have we not 
 given sufficient proof of her spirit amongst ourselves 
 in the scenes of A chill, of Ballymaciola, of Milltown, 
 and of Dingle? " I have told all my people," ex- 
 claimed priest Connolly, "to hiss, shout, and insult 
 them in every way they can, so as not actually to 
 break the law." Sufficiently intelligible ! If the 
 law but sanctioned an auto-da-fe. can we doubt that 
 this gentleman would soon let us have one ? And 
 if such persecutions abound despite the protection 
 of Victoria, what might we expect were another 
 Mary raised to the throne r ? 
 
 Such, then, is the system which borrows the name 
 of the Grod of love ! And of the manifold mysteries 
 which enwrap his providence, perhaps the most inex- 
 plicable is that he has so long endured a church 
 
ROME DESTROYS THE HEART. 169 
 
 which has revelled for ages in the blood of his 
 saints, and far outdone the cruelties of Attila and 
 Nero. Who can wonder that the glorified martyrs 
 seem restless and impatient beneath the altar, and 
 cry. " How long. Lord, holy and true, dost thou 
 not judge and avenge our blood on them that dwell 
 on the earth?" How often amongst ourselves has 
 Rome dried up like a scorching sirocco, the streams 
 of social kindness, and fulfilling* to the letter the 
 apocalyptic prediction, forbidden her people to "buy 
 or sell" to our missionaries ? How often has she 
 sought to freeze the springs of the Irish heart, and 
 forbidden the people ' : to give the missionaries a drink 
 of water," insomuch, that they have sometimes, in a 
 manner truly characteristic, evaded the stern com- 
 mand by giving them a drink of milk I Yet by 
 some they are deemed savages, whilst scarce a whis- 
 per of censure is breathed against that church which 
 thus labors to instil into their souls its scorpion 
 venom, and make hatred of Protestants the chief 
 article of their creed ; — a church which, wherever 
 she has the power, rends into shreds nature's ten- 
 derest ties, and sets the parent against the child, 
 and the child against the parent ; and which seems 
 to have become more wicked with advancing years, 
 till now in her growing decrepitude she is gnashing 
 her broken fangs at the young buoyant Spirit of 
 light and liberty that is shaking its wings over 
 Europe, and till those who erst were her credulous 
 
170 THE GRAND CAUSE. 
 
 apologists, would gladly join in the jubilant shout 
 which shall ere long ring to heaven — " Babylon is 
 fallen, is fallen !" 
 
 CHAPTER TV 
 
 ROME DEBASES THE WHOLE NATURE. 
 
 Thus have we demonstrated the blighting influ- 
 ence of Rome on the three chief parts of man's 
 nature. But there are various qualities essential to 
 human progress, which spring from these as branches 
 from the stem, and on which the character of Popery 
 is singularly displayed. As when the tree is light- 
 ning-struck, the blasting influence is seen on every 
 leaf and twig, suchjs the scathing effect of Popery, 
 not on the chief parts only, but on the minutest 
 ramifications of the character and conduct. We 
 can only trouble the reader with a very few ex- 
 amples. 
 
 The Devices. — Mark how the whole tendency of 
 Popery is to paralyze the energies and blight the 
 better qualities of man. What so certain to beget 
 mental inertness in all the affairs of life, as the 
 dreadful device of keeping him in a state of mental 
 torpor in regard to its grand concern, religion ? 
 Will the intellect which is always thrown into a 
 mesmeric sleep at the altar, not feel the deadening 
 
ROME DEBASES THE WHOLE NATURE. 171 
 
 effect iii the world ? Can the mind which is pinion- 
 ed one half its time use its wings so expertly the 
 remainder : or a man who is a mere machine to-day, 
 become by his simple volition a philosopher to-mor- 
 row 1 Then the whole tendency of Popery is to 
 make its victims social cripples, and their life a pro- 
 longed childhood From their cradles to their 
 graves they are dependent on their priest : he thinks 
 for them, praj^s for them, shrives them, anoints 
 them, manages all their eternal concerns, and inter- 
 feres pretty freely with their temporal also. They 
 must not even use their senses but as he directs ; 
 for when he tells them bread is no longer bread, 
 they must believe him. And thus their whole 
 training makes them helpless creatures ; they ac- 
 quire of necessity the habit of dependence ; and ac- 
 customed to confide to other hands their eternal all, 
 the greater interest, they come but too naturally to 
 confide their temporal all, the less. How sadly ex- 
 emplified in the case of our countrymen ! If they 
 want their rivers deepened, their harbors improved, 
 their very land drained, they look elsewhere for as- 
 sistance. Hospitals are established — they look to 
 parliament to support them ; trade is decaying — 
 they look to parliament to relieve them ; the potato 
 fails — they look to parliament to feed them ; they 
 want a Galway Packet Station, and look first to 
 England, then to America. Nay, they cannot even 
 get up a rebellion without seeking foreign aid : in 
 1798, Wolfe Tone presents himself before the 
 
172 THE GRAND CAUSE. 
 
 French Directory; in 18 48 Smith O'Brien waits 
 on Lamartine. And thus our poor country lies a 
 paralytic on the world's highway, crying to all na- 
 tions to come and help her along ! 
 
 Look farther to the havoc which Rome works on 
 one's spirit of independence. Such are the terrible 
 conditions imposed by this giant enslaver, that it is 
 scarcely possible to be at once a Papist and a man. 
 First, there sits the priest on the throne of God. the 
 keeper of that man's conscience, the jailor of his 
 mind, and the factor of his eternal inheritance — do 
 you expect such a man to stand erect before this 
 dread deity ; to dispute the will, however capricious, 
 or resist the commands however intolerable, of that 
 ghostly father, whose smile is heaven, whose frown 
 is hell? "I have power to strike you dead this 
 minute." exclaims Maria Monk's confessor. Of 
 course, with any but the most hopeless unbeliever, 
 this must have ended the controversy. 
 
 Then, reader, place yourself, where that poor Pa- 
 pist must often kneel, at the confessor's feet. There, 
 on pain of incurring mortal sin. you must open to 
 him the very depths of your soul ; thoughts which 
 you would rather die than to disclose to any other, 
 must all be divulged to him. There is no escaping, 
 for with the help of a thousand suggestive questions 
 furnished by Dens and Bailly. he will, ere you rise, 
 worm himself into your inmost heart, and sound the 
 lowest depths of your bosom. And this scene is so 
 often repeated, that in effect, whatever you are do- 
 
ROME DEBASES THE WHOLE NATURE. 
 
 173 
 
 ing. you feel as in the presence of this terrible be- 
 ing : it is as though he were ever dogging your steps, 
 penetrating your most retired haunts, and like some 
 ghost entering your midnight chamber and peeping 
 through the curtains of your couch. Could Satan 
 have devised a more deadly engine by which to ob- 
 literate within you every trace of manhood ? Is it 
 possible to look in his face, who knows all your se- 
 crets, and feel yourself a man ? If yet any shame 
 has survived this prolonged course of degradation, 
 must you not feel overwhelmed in presence of this 
 personator of the great Searcher of hearts ? Now, 
 surely one needs but to remember that this engine 
 of moral slavery is worked every day in every parish 
 of Ireland, in order to understand why the Irish 
 Roman Catholic is so often a spiritless and crouch- 
 ing serf. Can you wonder to hear of the Connaught 
 peasant, who crawled out on the road as the priest 
 rode by and kissed the footprints of his horse? or 
 feel much surprise to hear of O'Connell kneeling 
 down in the mud of Cork streets to receive the 
 priest's benediction ? or the English Arundel and 
 Surrey lately doing the same before the priests of 
 Limerick '? No. let but this serpent coil itself round 
 a man's heart, and English or Irish, he is a man no 
 longer. Well, accustomed to crouch before one 
 man, it becomes natural to bow down to all. The 
 willow that one storm has effectually bent, can never 
 afterwards stand erect against any ; and the man 
 who humbles himself to his priest, comes almost in- 
 
174 THE GRAND CAUSE. 
 
 stinctively to do the same to his landlord and his 
 master : and hence the obsequious servility of the 
 southern Roman Catholic, so singularly contrasting 
 with the northern Protestant's sturdy independence. 
 
 But there yet remains to be noticed another ele- 
 ment of moral slavery more terrible still. One 
 would have thought that with the afore-mentioned 
 engines of subjugation, Rome might have sat down 
 content ; but lest amongst her prostrate millions, 
 there might yet be found one to raise a freeman's 
 head, she has invented her doctrine of "intention," 
 according to which the validity of every ordinance 
 depends on the intentions of the priest who performs 
 it. If from ignorance, neglect, or sheer malevolence, 
 he does not in the ordinance " intend to do what the 
 church does," the ordinance is ipso facto utterly null 
 and void, and the victim of his carelessness or wick- 
 edness remains still in his sins. 
 
 We ask, Can Brahminisin or Buddhism present 
 anything like this ? On the priest's intention, for 
 instance, it depends whether the flour is a wafer or 
 a god : or whether, in partaking of the eucharist, 
 the worshipper is swallowing the Saviour, and thus 
 securing salvation, or adoring a bit of paste, and 
 thus committing mortal sin ! So is it with all the 
 other ordinances — on the priest's intention every- 
 thing depends, and the worshipper knows this. How 
 absolutely overwhelming is such a man's power, 
 whose mere intention can send a whole parish to 
 purgatory or farther ! Why, the Almighty himself 
 
ROME DEBASES TlfE WHOLE NATURE. 175 
 
 must be utterly lost sight of in presence of this 
 impostor-deity : — in his hands, and at his mercy, 
 must the genuine Roman Catholic believe himself 
 to be for time and eternity. Would you mock such 
 a man by talking to him of freedom, who lies at his 
 priest's feet in the most abject prostration, who has 
 nothing that he dare call his own, and who believes that 
 heaven is his if lie can only please and bribe his 
 master, while hell waits on this spiritual tyrant's 
 word, and follows his ghostly displeasure ? Oh ! 
 the most galling yoke that ever crushed the African 
 w,as liberty sweet to this. His chains at most can 
 but pierce into his bones, but here are chains which 
 eat through a man's soul ; and the deepest atrocity 
 lies in this, that it is his very feelings of devotion, 
 his very concern about his soul, all that is to be 
 admired in him as a poor sinner seeking salvation 
 — it is these which are taken advantage of, the bet- 
 ter to enslave and rain him. Surely it is not diffi- 
 cult to guess the author of such a contrivance; we 
 trust there is but one being in the universe capable 
 of the reach of wickedness it betrays. Say. is it 
 strange that our poor countryman, on whose credu- 
 lous ignorance such a doctrine is from infancy so 
 industriously palmed, should submit to any abuse 
 which his priest may choose to heap on him ; to be 
 flogged and kicked, nay. perhaps to see the last 
 indignity offered to his wife or daughter without 
 daring to complain? -'What, sir," exclaimed an 
 Irish laborer, when beaten by his priest till his face 
 
176 THE GRAND CAUSE. 
 
 was covered with blood, and asked how he could 
 endure it — " What. sir. strike a priest ! if I would 
 touch a priest, my arm would wither from the 
 shoulder blade." 
 
 Well, surely this at least completes the list of 
 Rome's enslaving schemes — surely this must be the 
 last fold of that fearful net. in whose meshes her 
 victims seem so hopelessly entangled — and surely 
 the skill of Popery's subtle author has nothing 
 worse to add. Alas ! our painful task is not yet 
 done — those who have read Michelet's k; Priests, 
 Women, and Families," will understand that there 
 remains to be unfolded one other device, the most 
 deeply diabolical of all. We have already hinted 
 at the amazing wisdom and goodness displayed in 
 making man " male and female ;" to that single 
 arrangement, with all the relations it creates, is our 
 race indebted for not only its existence, but a very 
 large amount of its virtue and happiness. The 
 felicity of paradise was imperfect without it ; and 
 the relation which was thus found necessary to 
 complete the joys of innocence, contributes more 
 than any other, when its laws are duly observed, to 
 mitigate the woes of fallen humanity. The church, 
 therefore, which would frustrate the designs of this 
 great arrangement, instead of laboring to secure its 
 fullest, healthiest results, must be an unutterable 
 curse to mankind. Well, we have seen the fearful 
 effects even of a partial interference with it in the 
 celibacy of the Romish priesthood — the terrible 
 
ROME DEBASES THE WHOLE NATURE. 177 
 
 revenge taken by nature, even for tnis compara- 
 tively slight violation of her laws. Then what must 
 be the effect, if. as we mow proceed to show. Rome 
 has ever labored not only to rob this divine arrange- 
 ment of its benign influences, but to invest ifc instead 
 with malign ones , and not only to frustrate woman's 
 holy destinies as the "guardian angel" of each gen- 
 eration, but to attempt to transform her into its 
 "destroying angel?" 
 
 Be it remembered that God has given woman an 
 influence almost incalculable, and a sphere to exert 
 it in all but boundless. By endowing her with the 
 softer sensibilities of our nature, he has made her, 
 in her own sphere, omnipotent for good. Her weak- 
 ness thus becomes her strength, and her reign one 
 of love : and she moves through society a centre and 
 a source of influences inestimably valuable in a world 
 like ours — softening its asperities, refining its gross- 
 ness, sweetening its bitterness, and alleviating its 
 woes. And these she exerts everywhere — as a child 
 in the nursery, as a sister in the family, as a daugh- 
 ter by her parents' side, in the hallowed affections 
 of a wife, and in the exquisite tenderness of a 
 mother. Oh, it were demon wickedness to mar or 
 blight such a merciful arrangement as this ! No 
 wonder the arch-fiend has always aimed to destroy 
 woman first as the surest means of destroying man ; 
 you see it in the first temptation, in the history of 
 the flood, and all over the world. Wherever Satan 
 reigns, there woman is debased ; she is the Mahoni- 
 
 12 
 
£78 THE GRAND CAUSE. 
 
 medan's toy, the Hindoo's captive, the African's 
 beast of burden, and the prostrate slave of all. And 
 if you would set 1 the Satanic skill and iniquity of 
 this, you need only to contrast the Christian mother 
 with the Heathen, or the Monicas with the Agrip- 
 pinas of mankind : the one giving the world an 
 Augustine, the other a Nero, and each the source 
 of a stream of moral influence, of which the one 
 proved a river of life, and the other a desolating 
 flood. 
 
 In Popery he has pursued the same policy, but 
 with a profounder subtilty. First, by his various 
 contrivances for discountenancing marriage — such 
 as its entire system of nunneries — he seeks to frus- 
 trate the designs of woman's existence : — to rob 
 mankind of her precious influences, and reduce her- 
 self to a social nonentity, buried alive in gloomy 
 cloisters, with nothing but the ghost and shadow of 
 womanhood remaining. And thither that hapless 
 creature is consigned ; to wage, as best she can, per- 
 petual war with all the feelings and adaptations of 
 her own nature : — by this dark contrivance trans- 
 formed at once from being the fairest creation of 
 God to be a pitiable anomaly on earth, unable to be 
 an angel, yet not permitted to be a woman, and thus 
 doomed to virtual suicide. 
 
 But since celibacy is too great an outrage on our 
 nature for even Rome to commit with much success, 
 her next and grand aim is to take possession of the 
 soul, which she cannot thus blight ; and to trans- 
 
ROME DEBASES THE WHOLE NATURE. 179 
 
 form those females whom she "cannot thus banish 
 from society, into tools by which the better to effect 
 her deep designs against it. 
 
 As the convent is her great instrument in the one 
 case, so is the confessional in the other ; — and will 
 the reader just attend while we briefly unfold a con- 
 trivance as diabolical as ever was hatched in hell, for 
 destroying woman's purity and degrading her soul. 
 The process begins in very infancy ; at the tender 
 age of five, the joyous-hearted little girl is dragged 
 to the confessional, like a lamb to the slaughter, to 
 have sins suggested of which she never thought be- 
 fore, and questions put from which innocence recoils ; 
 and that mere infant must there be cross-questioned 
 as to whether she has yet felt any carnal desires ! !* 
 As years advance, these questions increase in vile- 
 ness, and that innocent young creature, as often as 
 she approaches her confessor, must be dragged 
 through an examination so disgusting that we can- 
 not pollute our pages even with a sample : it is en- 
 ough to refer our readers to those depositories of ob- 
 scenity. Dens, Delahogue, and Bailly, in which there 
 are whole chapters on " immodest thoughts, words, 
 touches, looks, and acts," and all these must be 
 turned into questions, and by the female distinctly 
 answered ! There is no escape even for the blush- 
 ing virgin, for a " general confession may not only 
 be unprofitable, but even dangerous and improper,"! 
 
 * Dens, vol. vi. p. 204. 
 
 f Chit's " Familiar Instructions," p. 123. 
 
180 THE GRAND CAUSE. 
 
 and therefore i- it is necessary to explain every- 
 thing /"* Neither is matrimony the least protection ; 
 for these obscene inquisitors obtrude themselves into 
 the marriage chamber, demand the secrets of the 
 nuptial couch, and make the minutest inquiries 
 "circa actum conjugalem !" Nay, this infamous 
 system spares not the disconsolate ividoiv in her 
 weeds ; for it is a mortal sin even " to recollect the 
 joys once sanctioned b}' her marriage vow, and must 
 therefore be specially confessed. "f Only imagine 
 every Roman Catholic maid and matron in Ireland, 
 dragged annually at the least through this sink of 
 abomination, at the mere pleasure and after the 
 prurient fancy of some coarse bachelor priest, and all 
 this enacted in the name and beneath the mask of 
 religion ! Is it really possible that Roman Catholics 
 can tamely submit to this? Oh. does it not imply 
 a moral degradation absolutely pitiable ? How can 
 a father permit his lovely daughter to be exposed to 
 such on ordeal ? — how can a husband endure to have 
 his virtuous wife subjected to such debasement ? — 
 above all, how can a bashful female, she who would 
 prefer death to a tithe of this dishonor from any 
 other hands, submit to be robbed by an unmarried 
 priest of all that gives dignity to woman, and leave 
 the confessional a degraded thing ? We speak not 
 now of its debauching influence, we stop not to ask 
 by what miracle of preserving grace woman can evei 
 
 * Christian's Guide to Heaven, pp. 80. 81. 
 f " Progress of the Confessional." p. 20. 
 
ROME DEBASES THE WHOLE NATURE. 181 
 
 leave such a scene a virtuous being ; but we ask, 
 even were all that has ever been said and admit ted 
 of the confessional's debaucheries a monstrous libel, 
 even were woman always to escape destruction, how 
 can she possibly escape degradation ? If even a man 
 of any feeling cannot look his confessor in the face, 
 how can a woman attempt to do so? It is simply 
 impossible. Unless such scenes have obliterated her 
 feelings altogether, she must even in her own eyes be 
 a debased and humbled creature; and what a dread- 
 ful alternative this, alike fatal to her dignity, either 
 to have her modesty extinguished or continually 
 outraged ! 
 
 Now, mark the tremendous consequences. She 
 has humbled herself to her priest, and he has by 
 this means acquired over her a boundless authority. 
 She dare not resist it, — she never does ; for one 
 glance from that basilisk eye, darted into her soul, 
 is at any time enough to suppress the first risings 
 of revolt. Well, having thus secured her, the priest 
 has secured all the influence which God has given 
 her. All is made over to him, to be employed as 
 he directs, and from that hour she is transformed 
 into an evil genius. Descending from her lofty sta- 
 tion as the world's benefactress, she becomes the 
 mere menial and decoy of "the 'church." The 
 wholesome streams of influence which flowed from 
 her, are now drugged and poisoned ; her children, 
 her husband, her whole household, she influences as 
 the priest directs her, and thus, by one fell stroke, 
 
182 THE GRAND CAUSE. 
 
 the best safeguard of society is laid in ruins. 
 Satan lias again succeeded in his first great tempta- 
 tion ; and the plea of fallen Adam comes to mind — 
 " It was the woman whom thou gavest to be with 
 
 me 
 
 \- 
 
 The Fruits. — It is impossible here to trace out 
 all the effects of this profound conspiracy against 
 the best interests of mankind — we can only trouble 
 the reader With an example or two. Indeed in 
 this, as in our other chapters, our aim is rather to 
 give him the clue to each chamber of this dark 
 labyrinth, and leave him to follow its windings him- 
 self. 
 
 It is wonderful how similar are the fruits of all 
 false systems ; — how like, for example, are the 
 habits of the Pagan and the Papist, and the condi- 
 tion of the Irish hut and the Indian wigwam. One 
 of the most striking and usual effects of true religion 
 is cleanliness, and of false religion is filth. If clean- 
 liness is not " next to godliness," it is at least closely 
 connected with it ; for how seldom have you seen a 
 truly pious household who. in their whitewashed 
 walls and well-swept floor, did not bear pleasing 
 testimony to the gospel's elevating power ! Now, 
 in Protestant England, the humblest cottager wages 
 an eternal war with dirt. Enter if you will his lit- 
 tle kitchen, and every vessel is shining on the shelf: 
 and could you only pass from thence in an instant 
 into many an Irish Roman Catholic's parlor, you 
 
ROME DEBASES THE WHOLE NATURE. 183 
 
 would be at no loss to decide in which of the two 
 you would prefer to dine ! In fact, Popery is em- 
 phatically a filthy religion. The cabins of Irish 
 Roman Catholics are embowered in dirt, — you can't 
 pass near them without the risk of defilement : and 
 as you see their doors fronted by dung-heaps, on 
 which filthy children are wallowing, while their 
 parents are lazily lounging about, you can't help re- 
 garding the revolting spectacle as a visible protest 
 to heaven against a system which could so brutalize 
 immortal beings. Yes : and you who charge this 
 on our countrymen as such, have you ever been in 
 other Popish lands ? M. Houssel, speaking of his 
 tour in Switzerland, says — " I met a carrier who 
 enumerated all the clean cantons and all the dirty 
 ones ; the man was unaware that the one list con- 
 tained all the Protestant cantons, and the other all 
 the Popish ones."* And in the " holy city." where 
 is so instructively exemplified every feature of the 
 " mother of abominations," we have this one also ; 
 for Seymour declares, that ' : every species of filth, 
 and every kind of odor, greet the visitant on his 
 entrance among the streets of this city of the 
 church." - For filth, for odors, for indecency, for 
 all that is offensive to the eye, to the feelings, to 
 the habits of a cleanly and orderly people, the city 
 of Rome surpasses almost any other city in tne 
 world."! 
 
 * New York Evangelist. 1849 
 
 f Seymour's Pilgrimage to Rome. p. 139. 
 
184 THE GRAND CAUSE. 
 
 Another striking point of contrast between Chris- 
 tian and Pagan lands, is the measure of respect 
 which each shows to its dead. In the latter, for 
 instance, yon will see dead bodies lying unburied, 
 and half-devoured by birds and beasts of prey: Now, 
 every traveller has observed that a contrast precise- 
 ly similar exists between Protestant and Popish 
 countries. In our western graveyards, you will not 
 only see bones strewn about on the surface of the 
 ground, but half-decayed ends of coffins sticking out 
 of the graves : and only just contrast these horrid 
 golgothas with the neat-planted country churchyards 
 of Protestant Ulster and Britain ! Yet a still more 
 revolting scene is found in the Irish ivale — that 
 remnant of the funeral games of Panganism. in 
 which not only smoking and drinking, but all kinds 
 of amusement are indulged in ; and these too often 
 winding up with the characteristic finale of a row, 
 in which the belligerents have sometimes been Known 
 to struggle and tumble over the corpse itself ! Yet 
 the priest, by reason of his mighty influence, could 
 easily put down such practices, and vastly improve 
 the people's general habits ; but when has he ever 
 made the attempt ? And if you ask the reason, his 
 answer is, that it would be useless. So, then, he 
 who is omnipotent when a Bible is to be burned, or 
 a Scripture-reader mobbed, is, by his own confession, 
 only impotent for good ! 
 
 Instance, again, the general degradation which 
 prevails in all " dark places of the earth," with its 
 
ROME DEBASES THE WHOLE NATURE. 185 
 
 attributes of sloth and improvidence Give an Irish 
 peasant a patch of bog on which to build a hut and 
 plant potatoes, and he seems to have reached the 
 climax of his wishes. His brightest visions seem 
 realized in his cabin of mud.— his highest aspirations 
 in his rood of potatoes —and the motto of his life 
 seems henceforth to be. " Why should we think of 
 to-morrow?" There he vegetates; but not alone. 
 Whatever other precept he sets at naught, no man 
 seems more reverentially to regard the first great 
 command - Be fruitful and multiply." Perhaps by 
 eighteen he is married : and we have known the 
 " h appy pair" to be obliged to borrow the coat and 
 gown in which the nuptials were performed. Dur- 
 ing the late famine, a man who received daily relief 
 in Ballina. petitioned for a double supply, on the 
 ground that the committee were so kind and his 
 prospects had thus grown so bright, that he had 
 married a wife, and the extra relief he sought was 
 for her! Everything else is in keeping: time, 
 the most precious commodity to an Englishman, is' 
 by the Irish Roman Catholic, squandered with 
 lavish hand ; while to diligence he is so little accus- 
 tomed, that when working in the fields he must stop 
 to gaze at each passer-by ; and, in Ids case, the plea 
 of the unjust steward is reversed, for we have known 
 him to leave his •• digging" in the field to « beg" a 
 half-penny from a passing stranger. Indeed, beg- 
 ging seems the national trade, and never was a race 
 more fertile in expedients to awaken liberality and 
 
186 THE GRAND CAUSE. 
 
 impose on simplicity. They have been known to 
 make ulcere in their legs with bluestone : and you 
 would tlrink those naked children who pursue the 
 coaches along the road had the most unquench- 
 able thirst for learning, for ;; the half-penny" is al- 
 ways "to buy a book." Yes, though the sixth of 
 Ireland's population is in the poor-house, this 
 has scarce perceptibly diminished the number of 
 strolling beggars. By the highways, you see them 
 posted like sentinels : as you pass through a. town, 
 they follow you, invoking the saints' blessings on 
 your departed parents' souls. If you enter a shop, 
 they instantly surround the door ; and, even late at 
 night, you'll hear their monotonous call rising in the 
 stillness of the half-deserted streets. 
 
 Do you say it is because they are Irish ? We deny 
 the ungenerous charge. The Irish Protestant we 
 have known to be half starved in his dwelling before 
 he would divulge his wants. No ; it is the neces- 
 sary fruit of a system which, by degrading the whole 
 soul, begets of necessity the spirit of a beggar ; 
 which, by laying such stress on the merit of alms- 
 giving, holds out a premium to begging : and which, 
 by its various mendicant " orders," invests the trade 
 with not only the garb of respectability, but the 
 sanction of religion. Hence, what Popish country 
 does not swarm with' beggars? While you travel 
 for weeks through Protestant America without meet- 
 ing one, save from Ireland, every traveller tells you 
 how the Popish lands of Europe are filled with them. 
 
ROME DEBASES THE WHOLE NATURE. 187 
 
 Mr. Wylie had do soooer crossed the torrent which 
 divides the Protestant republic of Geneva from the 
 Popish kingdom of Sardinia, than amongst other 
 characteristic marks of desolation, he met troops of 
 beggars, whose " numbers seemed endless. Every 
 other mile, in the day's ride of 50 miles, brought 
 new groups, as filthy, squalid, and diseased, as those 
 which had been passed."* Or, perhaps you may 
 say, 'tis necessity which makes the Irish beg ? Alas ! 
 the shortest way to get rid of the importunity of 
 some of them, is, as we have known, to offer them 
 employment. And is it not common for Irish la- 
 borers to beg their way, not only going to the Eng- 
 lish harvests, but returning from them, no matter 
 what earnings they may be carrying back ; nay, to 
 resort to various schemes to avoid paying their fare 
 in the steamers which bring them home ? We have 
 seen the mate sometimes confining them in the hold, 
 sometimes kicking them round the deck, sometimes 
 stripping them almost naked, before they would con- 
 fess they had a farthing about them ; and in one 
 case, the honest sailor, in his indignation, flung the 
 poor wretch's waistcoat overboard, whereupon he 
 raised a howl of lamentation, exclaiming that he was 
 a ruined man : and then the truth came out that he 
 had several pounds sewed up in its folds ! 
 
 And these are thy trophies, Rome — the proofs 
 of thy divinity — the fruits of thy celestial sway ! 
 Oh, how oft, when witnessing such scenes as these, 
 
 * Wylie on the Papacy, p. 482. 
 
188 THE GRAND CAUSE. 
 
 has our very soul burned, not only with shame for 
 our country, but indignation at the system which has 
 made her the world's very scorn ! And we have felt 
 amazed at the effrontery of those priests who. daily 
 walking amid the ruins they have wrought, can not 
 only lift their heads like other men, but rage and 
 bluster the while against England as the cause of all 
 this mischief, and speak of themselves and their sys- 
 tem as the peerless embodiment of transcendent and 
 persecuted worth, and the only hope of Ireland's 
 elevation ! ! Surely in the light of these astounding 
 facts must the mist which has so long enveloped 
 Ireland be dissipated, and the contempt of which 
 she has been the innocent object, be henceforth lev- 
 elled against her cruel enslaver. For, if beneath 
 even bodily slavery the finest race on earth degen- 
 erate and become in time mere wrecks of humanity, 
 ! what must be the effects of such a moral thral- 
 dom lying with its whole weight on our countrymen 
 for ages ! — a thraldom which, masked in the guise of 
 Christianity, kills the energies that divine religion 
 quickens — brutalizes the feelings which it refines — 
 debases the nature which it exalts — in a word, as 
 thoroughly curses as ever it blessed — and makes the 
 whole man, to which the gospel would have given 
 the swelling bloom of health, like some spent and 
 palsied frame, the shattered remnant of what it was ! 
 
ROME BLASTS MAN'S TEMPORAL STATE. 189 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 ROME BLASTS MAN'S TEMPORAL STATE. 
 
 Such, then, is Rome. Like some parasitical plant 
 which embraces and kills the noblest tree, it twines 
 itself with deadly grasp around man's whole nature ; 
 or like some poison poured into the veins, it sends 
 its moral death-drugs through his whole soul. And 
 now, having seen how it must destroy a people, it 
 only remains to show how, in Ireland's case, it has 
 done so. And for simplicity's sake, we shall take 
 up the leading topics of the two first Parts of this 
 work which have not already been disposed of ; and 
 briefly applying our lohole line of argument to Ire- 
 land's financial, physical, social, and political state, 
 proceed to the completion of our demonstration. 
 
 The Financial. — Rome has impoverished Ire- 
 land indirectly by its influences^ and directly by its 
 imposts. 
 
 If she keeps her people sitting in darkness while 
 others are enlightened, steeped in vice while others 
 are virtuous, and their whole souls like a bow un- 
 strung while others are nerved with energy and life 
 — then, unless God were to rain gold from heaven, 
 is their poverty as inevitable as eternal laws can 
 make it. Why, Rome's very holidays tend in this 
 direction : her calendar contains a fast or feast for 
 
190 THE GRAND CAUSE. 
 
 every day in the year, and demands the observance 
 of seventy of these, exclusive of Sabbaths : so that 
 nearly a fifth part of every " good Catholic's" life- 
 time is consumed in the worship of dead men and 
 women ! And what must bo the effect of such con- 
 tinual interruptions to business on a nation's wealth, 
 and on all those habits which are the springs of 
 wealth % or how can the man avIio idles on Monday 
 and Wednesday, help feeling the unsettling effect 
 throughout the rest of the week ? 
 
 If, then. Rome's very devotions tend to poverty, 
 what must be the influence of her vices and crimes ? 
 We have proved that it is she that has filled the 
 land with violence ; at her door then lie, of course, 
 the disastrous consequences. It is she that is mainly 
 chargeable, not only with our enormous military, 
 constabulary, and jail expenditure — not only with 
 our ruinous outlay on law and lawyers — not only 
 with our crushing poor-rates — not only with the ac- 
 tual expense of our immoral habits themselves, but 
 with all the calamitous effects of these, direct and 
 reflex, on the trade and jwogress of the country. 
 And who can pretend to estimate these ? Think of 
 the loss sustained by one disturbed district, or the 
 injury inflicted by a single gang of ruffians, before 
 they come within the, grasp of the law at all : and 
 yet to all this positive loss you must add the still 
 larger negative item. You must enter our crimi- 
 nals' cells, and estimate, not only the injury they in- 
 flict on society, but the good they would have con- 
 
ROME BLASTS MAN'S TEMPORAL STATE. 191 
 
 ferred on it, had they only been virtuous — you must 
 wend your way to our seaports, and reckon the loss 
 sustained by the flight of our best people, who, in a 
 better state of society, would have prospered at 
 home — you mast then pass through every town and 
 parish, and calculate the loss incurred by the paral- 
 ysis of our trade, and the wretchedness of our agri- 
 culture ; — and, finally, you must visit every stream 
 and harbor, and reflect how many capitalists our so- 
 cial disorder has driven from our shores, and how 
 many more it has hindered from approaching them ; 
 all this, and more, you will be obliged to estimate, 
 before you can form a correct idea of the financial 
 curse of Popery. 
 
 We have already seen a little of Rome's direct 
 imposts, and in truth but a little ; for the amount it 
 wrings from the starving Irish is scarcely credible. 
 Poverty itself brings no exemption ; — we once knew 
 a common c/w^'-woraan to fast from her dinner for 
 days in order to procure her " voluntary offering;" 
 and in various towns 3011 see magnificent chapels 
 now rising to the skies, but while pleased with their 
 beauty, you perhaps little dream, that like the Egyp- 
 tian pyramids they have been reared by the sweat 
 of bond slaves, and owe their existence mainly to the 
 hard earnings of the poor. 
 
 We have shown how. during the horrors of the 
 famine. Rome fed on the alms of charity, and u glean- 
 ed in the rear of starvation/' It was during these 
 horrors that the Pope fled to Graeta ; and at the very 
 
192 THE GRAND CAUSE. 
 
 time when the priests were appealing to Protestant 
 liberality on behalf of their starving millions, they 
 were sending thousands of pounds to his "holiness:'* 
 who, in return, sent them his blessing, and a. few 
 hundreds of their own money to distribute amongst 
 the dying ! No wonder, truly, that our poor emi- 
 grants breathe freely when they reach the shores of 
 the west, and express themselves as thankful for 
 having escaped the exactions of their priests as those 
 of their landlords. No wonder that, with all their 
 efforts to •■bring their friends out.'" they are never 
 known to bring out their priests ! and where an oc- 
 casional priest does follow and join them, no wonder 
 that the first lesson they take pains to teach him is 
 that he is no longer in Ireland. " Sir," exclaimed an 
 Irish laborer on the banks of the Delaware, to a 
 priest who had insolently refused to take five dollars 
 for some rite — " Sir, do you think it is in Ireland 
 you have me ?" 
 
 Nay, not only has Rome extracted the morsel 
 from the mouth of hunger, but outraged those feel- 
 ings of our nature which even barbarians are accus- 
 tomed to respect. A young pair become attached, 
 and the priest often hastens the marriage for sake of 
 the fee, although he knows they must borrow the 
 money wherewith to pay him. Nay. one of our mis- 
 sionaries has detailed a case in which not only was 
 the match made by the priest, but the bride never 
 saw the bridegroom till she met him on the way to be 
 married ! and he adds, that when they met, the poor 
 
ROME BLASTS MAN'S TEMPORAL STATE. 193 
 
 bride thus addressed her future spouse — " May I 
 make bold to ask what is jour name?" But Koine's 
 golden harvest is by the deathbed and the grave ; 
 and in those solemn scenes where the most ruo-jred 
 
 Do 
 
 nature has melted, — where the hand of extortion has 
 let go its grasp, and unkindness itself has been known 
 to weep, she alone has remained unmoved : and by 
 working on a dying father's terrors, so often robbed 
 his children, even while weeping over him, that par- 
 liament itself has been obliged to protect them by 
 its Charitable Bequests' Bill. Oh, think of a church 
 of God thus feeding like a vulture on the dead as 
 well as the living ! Surely the bold highwajaaan is 
 honorable in comparison to the men who creep into 
 the death-chamber, and, alike unmoved by the groans 
 of the dying and the anguish of the living, do their 
 pilfering work beneath the cloak of religion and the 
 forms of law ! 
 
 Nor must we blame the Irish priest alone ; Rome 
 is everywhere the same spiritual maelstrom sucking 
 down the wealth of nations ; and the successor of the 
 fisherman who had neither t; silver nor gold," has in 
 all as;es been the world's great plunderer. While 
 the whole state revenue of Rome is but 8,000.000 or 
 9,000 000 of dollars, its church property is worth 
 400.000 000 of francs, and yields a revenue of 20,- 
 000,000 a-year.* Ay, and poor miserable Spain, 
 unable to pay any one else, is this moment paying 
 the priests 50,000,000 of dollars per annum. Now, 
 
 * Gavazzi, 13th Oration. 
 
 1 o 
 1«J 
 
194 THE GRAND CAUSE. 
 
 if bankrupt nations are thus mulcted even in these 
 days of Rome's impotence, imagine, if you can the 
 state of things when Europe lay in chains at her feet. 
 At one time a large portion of its entire property 
 had been drawn into her capacious jaws ; and it was 
 to prevent her from swallowing England up that the 
 law of mortmain was enacted; while those who see 
 the ruins of abbeys, cathedrals, and monasteries which 
 are thickly strewn over Europe, and reflect on their 
 enormous revenues, may form some idea of the pe- 
 cuniary millstone which once hung on the necks of 
 nations. 
 
 The Physical. — We have only space for a word 
 or two on the soil and climate of Popish lands. 
 " What !" you exclaim. i; does Rome even mar the 
 face of nature ?" Yes. dear reader, the ground was 
 cursed for man'sj?^ apostasy, and why wonder that 
 it should feel the effects of his last and greatest ? 
 And as if to show more clearly her scathing influ- 
 ence, it is usually the finest countries which God has 
 permitted Rome to occupy, while the poorest have 
 as commonly been assigned to Protestantism. To 
 the one he has given green Ireland, fair France, and 
 sunny Italy : and to the other barren Scotland and 
 sandy Holland ; yet the latter are blessed, and the 
 former so thoroughly blasted, that of Italy, for in- 
 stance, a late traveller could not help exclaiming,— 
 " The devil has again entered Paradise :" and this, 
 too, while • Protestantism found Britain a paltry 
 
ROME BLASTS MAN'S TEMPORAL STATE. /95 
 
 island, and America a vast wilderness, and lias made 
 them the pride of the world ! It is the same in 
 Ireland : Rome has possession of not only its best 
 provinces, but its most romantic spots. To her be- 
 long Wicklow, Kiliarney, Rosstrevor, and Lough 
 Grill : and who that has visited these lovely scenes 
 can forget the nuisances which are found in their 
 midst — who can forget the filthy beggars, for instance, 
 who in Kiliarney torment the tourist at every step 
 like summer flies in some sweet bower ; or help 
 adopting the very words of Baptist Noel, when gaz- 
 ing on a similar scene at Killaloe : — 
 
 " But in Ireland there is an omnipresent mischief, 
 and when you would let your thoughts repose among 
 the sweet influences of nature, then Popery looks in 
 on you like a spectre ; or, if it be half concealed 
 like a snake among the flowers, ' there comes a token 
 like a scorpion's sting,' warning you of its hateful 
 presence. I felt it at Kiliarney, I felt it at Ross- 
 trevor, and here it is again." Yes, and not only can 
 you trace the trail of this serpent along the ground, 
 but you sniff its odors in the breeze of heaven. 
 Cultivation affects climate, and cleanliness promotes 
 health ; and if to Popery we are indebted for un- 
 drained bogs and filthy cabins, then it is it we must 
 mainly thank for that damp which is the result of the 
 one, and those diseases which are caused by both. If, 
 then, Popery injures even our salubrious clime, what 
 report can we expect from^ other lands ? Instance 
 Italy, " the seat of the beast :" and in the days of the 
 
196 THE GRAND CAUSE. 
 
 Cresars, towns and villages stood where the Pontine 
 Marshes now send up their poisonous vapors, and 
 that malaria was but slightly felt which is now the 
 scourge of the land. 
 
 But it is in the rare you see the chief physical 
 effects of Popery. Eden suffered much by the fall, 
 but Adam suffered more : and we appeal to the 
 reader if we have not proved that those blemishes 
 which attach to our countrymen, are chiefly charge- 
 able on Popery. The very body feels its curse — 
 you see the ; ' mark of the beast" not only on the 
 "forehead" but the frame: and no marvel, when 
 you think of the influence of crime and misery on 
 bodily strength and stature. The contrast is re- 
 markable between the Roman Catholic peasant of 
 Kerry, and the Protestant peasant of Antrim : and 
 what is yet more striking, between the Roman 
 Catholic and the Protestant of Kerry itself. The 
 same contrast is seen between the Frenchman and 
 the Englishman ; and what demonstrates that this 
 is owing not to anything natural to these races, but 
 to some influence exerted upon them, is the fact that 
 the stature of the French has diminished, while that 
 of the English has increased. For, according to 
 Raudot in his "Decline of France." the height re- 
 quired for a French infantry soldier in 1789, was 
 but 5 feet 1 inch, and in 1832. a time of peace, it 
 had to be reduced to 4 feet 9 inches and 10 lines; 
 while in England, on the contrary, the minimum 
 height 20 years ago was 5 feet 4 inches, and now it 
 
ROME BLASTS MAN'S TEMPORAL STATE. 197 
 
 has risen to 5 feet 7. If such are the effects of 
 Popery on the body, what must be its influence on 
 the, soul ? We appeal for answer to all Popish lands. 
 What a contrast is the Brazilian to the American 
 and the Austrian to the Englishman ! — or where was 
 ever a finer race than the ancient Andalusian? and 
 what have the priests now made them ? — ' : they took 
 in hand a nation of heroes, and they have produced 
 a generation of hens."* In a word, no matter how 
 different the race, Protestants have everywhere the 
 same great moral features of resemblance ; and so 
 have Roman Catholics. And what singularly proves 
 the degrading power of Rome on the Irishman in 
 particular, is that it affects the very bravery which is 
 his national quality. How can a moral slave be a 
 hero? And so marshal him under priests as lead- 
 ers, with crucifixes as ensigns, and you find him fly- 
 in 2; before Cromwell, before William, before the sol- 
 diers of 1793; but place him in the ranks of the 
 British army, where his priest can no longer trample 
 on him, and though he remains a Papist, and is there- 
 fore the most troublesome soldier in his regiment, 
 his natural spirit of bravery comes again, for it was 
 not dead but sleeping, drugged by the opiate of 
 Popery — and so he has contributed his full share of 
 those laurels which England wears on her brow ! 
 
 And thus we demonstrate that if the Irishman is 
 
 worse than other men. it is Rome which has made 
 
 him so ; and, oh ! it is melancholy to see this poor 
 
 * Bishop Mechior Cano — quoted by Gavazzi. 8th Oration. 
 
 ,, -J 
 
198 THE GRAND CAUSE. 
 
 victim of her guilt wandering the world, like some 
 outcast from society, with that reputation blasted 
 which is more precious than life. True religion 
 gives a character, and in these days character is 
 everythiug : but. alas our poor countryman ! his 
 very name is enough to close against him the ave- 
 nues to success. How often do you read in adver- 
 tisements for clerks and servants, the humiliating 
 not a bene — " No Irishman need apply !" How often 
 when in search of employment in English and Scotch 
 towns, is the door rudely shut in his face the mo- 
 ment his brogue is heard ! And how often have we 
 known him on that account to deny his country and 
 try to disguise his fatal shibboleth ! Yes, and be- 
 cause the Ulster Protestant has a character, and the 
 Minister Roman Catholic has none, how often does 
 the latter in other lands attempt in his distress to 
 pass himself off as a native of Ulster ! What a fear- 
 ful odds is against him here, when at the least he 
 requires years of good conduct to make the charac- 
 ter with which a Scotchman starts the first hour ! 
 And what a pitiable condition is this to be reduced 
 to : if he remains at home to be in danger of starv- 
 ing, — if he leaves it in quest of an honest livelihood, 
 to be still exposed to starvation, — and however inno- 
 cent he may be, to find himself everywhere a shunned 
 and suspected man ! 
 
 The Social. — On this section we need scarcely 
 dwell. If, as we have shown, Rome violates those 
 
ROME BLASTS MAN'S TEMPORAL STATE. 199 
 
 eternal principles on which the existence of society 
 depends ; surely social disorder at least must be the 
 result. It follows inevitably from our whole argu- 
 ment, that the direct tendency of Popery is to lay in 
 the dust the entire social fabric. And it is truly 
 wonderful how distinctly its effects are seen in the 
 general condition of its victims. It has smitten the 
 man, and you see the results on all that is his — in 
 his filthy dwelling and ill-trained family, his weed- 
 grown fields and broken fences. The master mind 
 of the household is injured, and you see the effect on 
 everything around : the mainspring of the watch is 
 out of order, and it tells on the motion of every 
 wheel. How truly exemplified have we already 
 found this to be in our countryman's Habits ; it 
 only now remains to trace it in his Pursuits. 
 
 Remember, then, dear reader, how Christianity 
 quickens, and Popery kills, the energies of man ; 
 how the one is like the sun in spring, waking all na- 
 ture to life, and the other like the frost in winter 
 
 i 
 
 overspreading it with the dreariness of death ; and 
 you have the reason, which some cannot, and others 
 will not see, why there is as great a contrast be- 
 tween Protestant and Popish communities, as be- 
 tween the flowing tide and the stagnant pool. How 
 mournfully illustrated in Ireland's case ! How much 
 has been done by public and private philanthropy to 
 infuse a little life into her sluggish veins ! yet, like 
 some exhausted patient, she continues to sink in 
 spite of every restorative : each proves, at the best 
 
200 THE GHAX23 L'AUSE 
 
 but a temporary stimulant /whose effects disappear 
 as soon as it is withdrawn : and when there does 
 seem a slight amendment, you are afraid to trust it, 
 and can never tell whether it may be only like the 
 occasional flicker of a dying lamp. The priest sits 
 as a nightmare on the social energies, and presides 
 the evil genius of the stagnation he creates. And 
 this is so manifest, that could Ireland and Scotland 
 exchange populations, the one would become a gar- 
 den, and the other return to the wilderness state ; 
 and could each have its ancient inhabitants restored, 
 how soon would it resume its ancient character ! Is 
 it not the same in all Popish lands ? What a social 
 contrast they present to Protestant ones, in spite of 
 their superior natural advantages — instance the two 
 great European peninsulas. Spain and Italy ! What 
 prodigious commercial facilities are theirs ! Yet 
 how long, think you, would their inhabitants have 
 dwelt in the woods of America, or on the swamps of 
 Holland, before they would have made them the 
 homes of commerce and wealth 1 In truth, wherever 
 Popery flourishes, nothing is in vigor but Popery. 
 Had it still reigned over Europe, where would now 
 have been its steamers, its railroads, its telegraphs, 
 its forests of shipping, or its ten thousand inventions, 
 which are the wonder of the world ? Nay, with all 
 the surrounding stimulus of that Protestantism 
 which has created these, how much of them have 
 Popish nations yet % Look at their miserable towns, 
 with grass on the streets, and the people lounging 
 
ROME BLASTS MAN'S TEMPORAL STATE. 201 
 
 about as though motion were a burden ; or their 
 best seaports, with a few paltry craft, and their finest 
 harbors, almost like that of Tyre, a " place for fish- 
 ermen to spread their nets ;" — everything s/i// as 
 though they were asleep, or like some blighted for- 
 est which hears not the voice of spring ; — and all be- 
 cause they are, in reality, lying benumbed and 
 stunned beneath the stroke of this moral torpedo ! 
 
 Moreover we impeach Popery as the grand indirect 
 hindrance of our social progress : as the parent, for 
 instance, of that feudalism whose remains still so 
 much impede it, That cnrse cannot exist under a 
 pure Christianity: its spirit cannot but exist under 
 Paganism and Popery. And so we find that, if 
 brought forth by the former, it was. at least, brought 
 up by the latter : nourished most in Rome's palm- 
 iest days ; received its deadly wound at the Refor- 
 mation : and in every country has just decreased as 
 pure Protestantism has increased. And it must be 
 so. Popery being the intensest form of spiritual 
 despotism, not only has the strongest affinity for 
 civil and social despotism, but creates that social 
 condition from which they necessarily spring. We 
 have seen that the man who is accustomed to crouch 
 before his spiritual superior, soon comes to crouch 
 before his social superior. Slavery becomes his 
 state : and once divide society into haughty priests 
 and prostrate people, and it will, of consecpience, 
 divide itself into barons and serfs, masters and 
 slaves, and produce, through all its ramifications, 
 
202 THE GRAND CAUSE. 
 
 those various forms of petty tyranny beneath which 
 Ireland, and all other Popish countries, groan. In- 
 stance our chief social grievance, landlord tyranny : 
 and is it not. iu all our provinces, mitigated in pro- 
 portion to their Protestantism, from Connaught to 
 Ulster? Just because Protestantism, by begetting 
 all those qualities which improve the man, renders 
 any extensive oppression impossible : for. if it does 
 not so improve the landlord's own heart that he will 
 not oppress, it so elevates the tone of society that he 
 dare not. And this healthy tone is, after all, not 
 only the best preventive of abuses, but. in the long 
 run, the only effectual one ; for not only do all use- 
 ful laws' spring from it, but without it they are com- 
 paratively worthless. Now, we have demonstrated 
 that Popery either destroys or prevents the exist- 
 ence of such a tone : and so it follows, that the 
 landlord tyranny against which our priests exclaim, 
 would, at the least, be greatly mitigated but for 
 themselves. What landlord would dare attempt in 
 Kent or the Lothians the same acts of cruelty which 
 are committed with impunity in Galway 1 And the 
 Tenant-Right leaders themselves admit that their 
 chief hindrance is the want of that lofty, virtuous 
 public feeling, which is the best means of overawing 
 the oppressor : which would compel both landlord 
 and legislature to listen to their claims : and which 
 nothing but the blessed Bible has ever yet created. 
 
 Here. then, we have a monument of Rome's 
 destroying power mournfully instructive — a conn- 
 
ROME BLASTS MAN'S TEMPORAL STATE. 203 
 
 try at once a garden and a grave ; indented by har- 
 bors without a sail, pervaded by rivers whose banks 
 are still ; with above the finest clime unavailed of, 
 beneath the richest mines uuwrought, around the 
 most fertile soil untilled; and inhabited by a race, 
 which in natural parts have few superiors amongst 
 the sons of men. Well, let the extent of the ruin 
 at least serve to convince us of the malignity of the 
 cause. And when we behold Ireland teeming with 
 natural stores, yet starving ; covered with improve- 
 ment societies, yet a desert ; and receiving millions 
 of aid. yet a beggar ; — when we see Scotchmen in 
 our banks, and Irishmen in their prisons; foreign 
 ships doing our trade, and our countrymen not the 
 crews but the cargoes; — when, in short, we look on 
 every jail and poorhouse, soldier and policeman, oh ' 
 let it give fresh zeal to our evangelistic efforts, and 
 fervor to our prayers on behalf of a land on which 
 God has so long permitted Rome to do her worst, 
 — as if He thereby designed it to be a special 
 warning to all nations to beware of her blasting 
 power. 
 
 The Political. — We charge on Popery mainly 
 Ireland's political evils. First, but for it those 
 grievances which exist amongst us would either have 
 been mitigated or long since removed. There is a 
 moral state which invites misrule, and another which 
 makes it impossible. Demosthenes keenly felt this 
 when he told the Athenians that even were Philip 
 
204 THE GRAND CAUSE. 
 
 dead, their conduct would raise up another Philip. 
 It has been the experience of all ages, that rulers 
 will enslave if the people will let them ; and that 
 the only effectual breastwork against the encroach- 
 ments of the one, is the elevation of the other. It 
 is only below a certain moral level that a nation can 
 be trampled on, and the moment it gets above this it 
 flings off the oppressor. Hence, Popish lands are 
 the home of despotism, and Protestant lands the 
 sanctuary of freedom. Hence America, Scotland, 
 England, have flung off the tyrant's yoke. If. then, 
 Ireland is in bondage, as some maintain, it must be 
 because she lacks those qualities which would have 
 secured liberty for her just as certainly as for them: 
 and hence those priests who loudly complain of her 
 thraldom, are themselves convicted as indirectly the 
 cause ; for had any other nation than England been 
 placed by her side, would not the result have been 
 the same? The name, did we say? — Let the pres- 
 ent state of Europe answer the question. It was in 
 England's power to oppress Ireland to any extent 
 for aught such a priest-ridden nation could have 
 hindered her ; and had England continued Popish, 
 all history is a fable if she would not have oppressed 
 her. Thus it follows, that the political blessings 
 Ireland enjoys, have sprung from England's Prot- 
 estantism^ while such political wrongs as she suffers 
 are indirectly owing to her oivn Popery . Nay. in 
 truth, the worst grievances she has ever endured 
 are directly chargeable on Rome. Were not those 
 
ROME BLASTS MAN'S TEMPORAL STATE. 205 
 
 " disabilities," for instance, of which Roman Catho- 
 lics have so loudly complained, in great part of 
 their own procuring? Did not Rome convince our 
 fathers, by too many unmistakable proofs, that they 
 must either bind her, or themselves submit to be 
 bound? And when they saw that she never got 
 her hands loose but the first use she made of her 
 liberty was to spring on themselves^ what else could 
 they do but bind her again ? 
 
 So much for our political grievances. We next 
 assert that Popery robs of their benign influence 
 most of our political blessings. Instance its inllii- 
 ence on our laws. A highly virtuous state of so- 
 ciety makes somewhat tolerable the worst laws, 
 while a vicious state renders mischievous the best ; 
 the one turns the evil into good, and the other the 
 good into evil. In Scotland, for example, those 
 taxes on servants, dogs, &c, from which we are ex- 
 empt, have proved blessings, by leading the people 
 to a simpler style of living ; while our exemption 
 has proved a curse, by encouraging in us a more ex- 
 pensive one. In Ulster, again, the ]}oor-latv works 
 so well, that several poorhouses are almost self- 
 supporting ; while in Minister several unions are 
 bankrupt, and the very guardian's board rooms are 
 the scenes of party violence. And had the Scotch 
 Presbyterians got those £8,000.000 of relief which 
 we so shamefully mismanaged ; judging by their 
 whole character, we are entitled to assert that they 
 would have annihilated pauperism in Scotland. 
 
206 THE GRAND CAUSE. 
 
 Alas, it is the same, with almost every other effort 
 of legislation. O'Connell boasted he could " drive a 
 coach and six through any Act of Parliament :" and 
 thus, in direct contradiction to the whole aim of his 
 life, unconsciously proclaimed how little mere legis- 
 lation can do if it has not a virtuous community on 
 which to operate. 
 
 Instance, again, our glorious Constitution. Take 
 that very bulwark of liberty, trial by jury ; and we 
 have demonstrated by various facts that Popery has 
 in numerous cases made it an absolute mockery, and 
 that justice would be infinitely safer in the hands 
 of the judge. Hence the friends of truth and order 
 are rejoicing in the late " Justice's Act," which vir- 
 tually transfers so much power from the juries to 
 the magistrates. So utterly incompatible is the 
 genius of Popery with that of liberty, — so unsuited 
 does it seem to any other state than one of slavery, 
 — that even this trifling approximation towards 
 despotism has done wonders in quieting those 
 horse- whipping priests, who, turning our very con- 
 stitution against itself, trampled down the liberty 
 of whole districts because they knew that no Popish 
 jury would convict them. 
 
 Take one other bulwark of British liberty, the 
 '•elective franchise." Between the landlord and the 
 priest this has also been little better than a mock- 
 ery ; for the people must generally vote for what- 
 ever candidate these masters direct. If they dis- 
 obey the former, they are ejected : if they rebel 
 
RO?,lE BLASTS MAI^S TEMPORAL STATE. 207 
 
 against the latter, tliey are ■ damned." * ; Who- 
 ever." exclaimed Father John O'Sullivan from the 
 altar, on the eve of an election for Kerry — ;i who- 
 ever will vote for that renegade, the Knight of 
 Kerry, I won't prepare him for death, but will let 
 him die like a beast, neither will I baptize his chil- 
 dren.-'* Fancy, then, these people between those two 
 tyrants — the one threatening temporal ruin, and the 
 other eternal ! It is all very well when both sup- 
 port the same candidate ; and right thankful are the 
 poor creatures to escape by being simply robbed of 
 their rights as freemen. But the landlord, being 
 often a Protestant, is frequently opposed by the 
 priest ; and then, imagine if you can the dilemma 
 of the people ! Still the Scylla of beggary is 
 nothing to the Charybdis of perdition ; the terrors 
 of the confessional far exceed even those of the 
 " crowbar brigade ;" and so the priests generally 
 carry it over the landlords, have frequently boasted 
 that they could " return cow-bo} r s to parliament," 
 and have often led their dupes to the hustings when 
 they scarce even know the candidate's name ! Thus 
 one of the dearest rights of freemen is by Popery 
 transformed into not only a yoke of bondage, but 
 such an instrument of ruin, that thousands of the 
 people would deem its withdrawal the greatest mercy 
 that England could extend them. Yet these priests 
 are the champions of popular liberty ! — and one of 
 the standing themes of their platform harangues is 
 
 * See Progress of Confessional, p. 66. 
 
208 THE GRAND CAUSE. 
 
 the deficiency of the suffrage, and the necessity for 
 its extension ! ! 
 
 Finally. Rome is the direct cause of our political 
 agitations. It has been well said, that it is her na- 
 ture to produce tyranny when she is in power, and 
 rebellion when she is not : and this single sentence 
 is the key to the political intrigues of the priesthood 
 in every land. How has it been exemplified in Ire- 
 laud, making her entire history one of disaffection 
 and rebellion ! Or who so simple as still to doubt, 
 that the real aim of the Irish priesthood, through 
 all their political struggles, has not been equality 
 but ascendency, not liberty for the people but su- 
 premacy for themselves ? Shall we call it charity 
 or infatuation which refuses to see that the real 
 meaning of Irish agitation is the restlessness of 
 priestly restraint? Can any man believe that the 
 love of popular liberty is the reason why these rev- 
 erend agitators have kept the country simmering for 
 ao;es. and sown it thick with the seeds of lawlessness 
 and crime ; or doubt that the real yoke which galls 
 them is our freedom, and that had we but the laws 
 of Italy or Spain, which degrade the people and exalt 
 the priests, they would be as loyal as their brethren 
 of those realms? Talk of Popery as the friend of 
 liberty ! whose every dogma breathes despotism, and 
 whose every act exemplifies it ! That any Protestant 
 should ever doubt its intolerance, because its priests 
 have had sometimes the hardihood to deny it, is to 
 us a matter of perfect astonishment. Surely the 
 
ROME BLASTS MAN'S TEMPORAL STATE. 209 
 
 last two years might be sufficient to open the blind- 
 est eyes. Those priests, during the revolutions of 
 1848, with a subtlety altogether worth}* of them, 
 appeared foremost in the republican ranks, and were 
 the noisiest of the crowds who shouted. " liberty, 
 equality, fraternity," — were all the while quietly 
 waiting the turn of the tide ; and so are now the 
 avowed leaders of that dreadful conspiracy which is 
 formed against the freedom of Europe. Liberty ! 
 Are they not making every effort which conscious 
 guilt and terror can suggest to extinguish the spirit 
 of freedom in the world ? Is not Pio Nono at this 
 moment the rallying point of all Europe's trembling 
 despots ? Has he not heaped paternal benedictions 
 on the perjured tyrant of Naples, and the unprinci- 
 pled usurper of France? And is not his own des- 
 potism so intolerable, that he needs two nations to 
 protect him from the violence of his oppressed chil- 
 dren? Liberty! His own poor subjects cannot 
 wring from the " Holy Father" one single, drop of 
 liberty's sweet cup. And is not the whole Romish 
 Church publicly rejoicing in a series of the most 
 shocking outrages, ever committed against liberty 
 and humanity, by Louis Napoleon Bonaparte ? Did 
 not Cullen himself, in a late letter to the Umvers, 
 echo the blasphemy now ringing from every conti- 
 nental altar, and ascribe these atrocities to the special 
 interference of Providence? Yet he is the head of 
 those Irish priests who have for years been the 
 
 champions of freedom ! — and who now, while lavish- 
 
 14 
 
210 THE GRAND CAUSE. 
 
 ing their blessings on Europe's basest tyrants, are 
 defaming its most hallowed patriots ! Instance Kos- 
 suth, that representative and symbol of outraged 
 freedom. When the world was doing honor to the 
 illustrious exile, they not only stood sullenly aloof 
 but betook them to their usual weapon, slander ; 
 when gladness beamed on the brows of thousands, 
 the scowl of vexation lowered upon theirs ; and 
 when both shores of the Atlantic resounded with 
 shouts of welcome to the Magyar hero, their conduct 
 clearly testified that they would have shouted more 
 joyfully over his grave. How often have we heard 
 Irish Roman Catholics speak with rapture of Amer- 
 ican freedom, and long to fly to that land of promise 
 from Britain's Egyptian thraldom ; little imagining 
 that America owed this liberty, under God, to those 
 puritans whom they are taught to abhor, and that 
 but for them it might now have been like such lands 
 of Popish colonists as Brazil and Mexico ! Yes, the 
 poor creatures little know that the freedom that they 
 enjoy even here is owing to Protestantism : that 
 were Ireland's rulers Popish, it would fare no better 
 than other Popish lands : that in Protestant coun- 
 tries only can Roman Catholics breathe and speak 
 freely, without dreading a spy in every companion, 
 and an arrest in every corner : and that if over such 
 Popish lands as France, during her short-lived re- 
 publics, liberty has ever hovered, it has only been, 
 like the bird of Noah, over a wide waste of waters 
 seeking in vain for a spot to rest on ! 
 
— ~1 
 
 ROME BLASTS MAN'S TEMPORAL STATE. 211 
 
 Thus Popery in various ways blasts man's tem- 
 poral state. By demoralizing it degrades, by doing 
 both it impoverishes, and by impoverishing it farther 
 degrades and demoralizes. By withholding knowl- 
 edge it enslaves and beggars, and by these it renders 
 the acquisition of knowledge impracticable ; so that 
 here we have a course of action and reaction going 
 on, of cause and eifect constantly reproducing each 
 other. And thus, like the snakes of Laocoon, this 
 great red dragon has twined itself round every limb 
 of the body social, in so many deadly coils that dis- 
 entanglement seems hopeless, and death inevitable. 
 Yet think of the unblushing effrontery with which 
 the Irish priests are this moment lauding it as God's 
 choicest blessing to man. Think of Dr. Cullen, 
 while doing his utmost to complete the degradation 
 of which his predecessors have left so little to be 
 done, having the hardihood to say, that Borne u has 
 been tlie instructress and civilizer of all nations of 
 tJie earth. Every noble and useful institution that 
 we possess has originated with her ; and to her are 
 due tJie preservation of the arts and sciences in t/ie 
 age of darkness, and their revival and diffusion at 
 a later period ! /"* Ay. these are the terms in 
 which " the Primate of all Ireland" addresses Chris- 
 tendom in the nineteenth century ! If he had meant 
 the most cutting sarcasm on his religion, he could 
 not have expressed himself better ; and this single 
 sentence proves how utterly hopeless are the men 
 
 * Address to the Corporation of Drogheda Aug. 17, 1851. 
 
212 THE GRAND CAUSE. 
 
 whose own Chief is so reckless as to make such an 
 outrageous assertion in the very face of the world. 
 When at the late Dublin " Defence" Demonstration 
 Mr. Moore ventured to hint that a Pope could per- 
 secute, this " head of the Irish Church" in holy hor- 
 ror stopped him~ assured him that Rome was " the 
 parent of liberty," and proved it by refusing him 
 liberty to explain ! Oh, if such is our metropolitan 
 primate, what must be our rural priests ! If he 
 could thus speak in the face of Christendom, what, 
 think you, will they stop at amongst a peasantry 
 whom by such fearful contrivances they have so well 
 prepared to believe any falsehoods ! If he thus ven- 
 tured to bully a member of Parliament, how must 
 they handle their degraded slaves ! And if that 
 member did not dare to open his lips in reply to a 
 statement so outrageous, what must be the prostrate 
 vassalage in which the common people crouch and 
 cower at the feet of their ghostly tyrants ! 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 ROME BLIGHTS MAN'S ETERNAL PROSPECTS. 
 
 We have now reached a part of our subject before 
 which all the rest must fade like the lamp in the 
 light of day. It is the unceasing assurance of One 
 who has the best right to know, that in comparison 
 to eternity all which ever engrossed us in time is as 
 
ROME BLIGHTS MAN'S ETERNAL PROSPECTS. 213 
 
 the dancing bubble on the stream. He assures us 
 that we stand on a narrow isthmus, with on one side 
 an ocean of bliss, and on the other a lake of fire ; 
 and He conjures us by such motives as might wake 
 the rocks and stir the tenants of the grave, to seek 
 the one and flee the other. If, therefore, we find 
 Rome exposing its dupes to that fiery perdition 
 while pretending to save them from it. and in order 
 to do so, borrowing the name of Jesus, and steal- 
 ing the passwords of heaven, then are all its other 
 atrocities angel innocence to this : and it stands 
 forth to the execration of the universe as the most 
 dreadful plot against the human soul that ever was 
 hatched in the depths of hell. 
 
 In proof of this, it were surely enough to refer to 
 our previous argument. Would you say that a system 
 which so utterly blasts the earth, could be possibly 
 fit for the skies ? — that a church which makes a hell 
 below, could make a heaven above ? — or that those 
 eternal laws which are essential to the safety of the 
 universe, are dispensed with only in its great me- 
 tropolis ? The point, therefore, is already proved, 
 unless you suppose that God requires higher qualifi- 
 cations for earth, his footstool, than for heaven, his 
 throne ; or that He who cannot endure sin even on 
 this fallen earth, permits it to deluge the most glori- 
 ous of worlds ? But as there is a godless liberalism 
 abroad now-a-days, which calls it bigotry to say that 
 the Romanist is in any great danger — which, be- 
 neath the stolen garb of charity, dishonors Grod, 
 
214 THE GRAND CAUSE. 
 
 leaves souls to perish, and paralyzes the efforts of 
 those who would save them — and which, perhaps, 
 may even ?ay that we have drawn too dark a pic- 
 ture of Rome in this book — we shall now take her 
 even as they would dress her out for view ; and, 
 to leave them forever without excuse, prove our 
 fearful charge with all the clearness of demonstra- 
 tion. 
 
 They will at least grant that happiness or misery 
 depends mainly on the state of the heart. They 
 are aware that Hainan, a premier, was wretched 
 because a gate-keeper would not bow to him ; and 
 Ahab, a king, took to bed because denied a patch 
 of ground ; and the world's Conqueror wept because 
 he could not push his conquests to the stars : and 
 they will surely admit that men torn with such pas- 
 sions must anywliere be wretched. Yet all men 
 have within them the germs, at least, of the same 
 passions ; and hence, till these are crushed, true 
 happiness is out of the question. Surely they must 
 see this ; yet we shall make it still more plain. G-od 
 himself is infinitely happy only because he is infi- 
 nitely good. It cannot be because he is in heaven, 
 for he is everywhere ; nor because he is Lord of tbe 
 Universe, for he was happy before it was made : 
 nothing, therefore, remains from which it can spring 
 but his own infinite excellence. 'Tis the same with 
 all his creatures. Angels do not surely leave their 
 bliss behind them, when they come down from heaven 
 on errands of love ; nor devils their misery, when 
 
ROME BLIGHTS MAN'S ETERNAL PROSPECTS. 215 
 
 they come up from hell on their schemes of wicked- 
 ness. No : their own bosoms are a heaven and a 
 hell respectively. We ourselves also feel this ; with 
 all our efforts to find happiness without, our truest 
 happiness is found within, and consists not so much 
 in where as in what we are. We see it in the 
 serenity of many a cottager, and the suicide of many 
 a prince ; in the dark scowl of villany. and the sweet 
 smile of kindness : and even in the peevish face of 
 the child when naughty, and ins beaming counte- 
 nance when good. If therefore, you would make 
 us happy in any world, there is but one way — make 
 us good. Substitute in our hearts one set of affec- 
 tions for another, radiant kindness for lowering 
 malignity, transparent truth for sneaking falsehood, 
 noble generosity for despicable selfishness, open 
 frankness for sullen suspicion, in a word, ethereal 
 holiness for foul pollution ; and is it not perfectly 
 manifest, that such a mere exchange of affections 
 were to pass from hell to heaven, and that witltout 
 this no external enjoyments could materially avail ? 
 Now, to effect this change is the grand object of 
 the gospel. Its whole aim is to purify the heart. 
 By doing this, it nips both sin and misery in the 
 bud. and thus necessarily secures happiness on earth, 
 and meetness for heaven. Here is its blessed plan, 
 which, for simplicity of design and perfection of suc- 
 cess is worthy of its glorious Author. Here is 
 neither mystery nor magic, but the most perfect sys- 
 tem of adaptation. By the Divine Spirit thus turn- 
 
216 THE GRAND CAUSE. 
 
 ing a man from sin to holiness, he must become a 
 good and therefore a happy man. 
 
 Look now to false systems of* religion, and they 
 never once aim at the heart ; on the contrary, Satan's 
 grand object seems throughout them all to be to 
 prevent the entrance of one holy feeling. Their 
 whole round of worship is a substitution of the for- 
 mal for the spiritual. Everything Is designed for 
 the senses, and nothing for the heart: so that their 
 most imposing ceremonials are but pompous mock- 
 ery, and their devoutest worshipper a whited 
 sepulchre. Yet is not this a perfect picture of 
 Rome ? In her system, all is pardon — regeneration 
 is unknown — salvation in sin, never salvation from 
 sin. The very term holiness is bereft of its mean- 
 ing, and made a mystic sign — so we have holy water, 
 salt, oil, clay, wells, loughs, trees — everything but a 
 holy heart. All is external — penance of the body 
 for sorrow of soul, confession to the priest for con- 
 trition before God, corporeal sufferings on earth, and 
 material fires in purgatory. Even the means of 
 grace are made substitutes for grace. Tliose pipes 
 and conduits of the waters of life, whose whole vir- 
 tue lies in their connection witli the Fountain, are 
 substituted for the waters they were meant to con- 
 vey ; so you have devotions whose value is their 
 number, not their fervor — the fact of their perform- 
 ance is everything, the spirit is nothing at all. We 
 ask, can this sanctify? Does it do so '. We see in 
 God's gracious plan the most beautiful connection 
 
ROME BLIGHTS MANS ETERNAL PROSPECTS. 217 
 
 between the means and the end : but what connec- 
 tion is there between holy water and a holy life 
 
 between bleeding knees and a bleeding heart ? The 
 one, religion cannot but make holy, yet it is a " dam- 
 nable heresy ;" the other can only do so by some 
 such magic as the witches of Macbeth would have 
 employed, yet it is the religion of the holy God ! 
 Oh, if this system can save, of course so can pagan- 
 ism ; for its scheme of salvation is precisely similar. 
 Do you say we are overstating the case? Enter 
 any Irish chapel during mass — mark that priest in 
 his fantastic robes, surrounded by boys in white 
 frocks, often the greatest scamps in the parish — ob- 
 serve his mystic movements, his bows and genuflex- 
 ions : now turning to the altar, and then to the peo- 
 ple ; shifting the mass-book to one side, and then to 
 the other — and remember that most of all this is 
 dumb show, and when he does speak, it is to mutter 
 id a language the people neither hear nor under- 
 stand. And do you say this has the least effect on 
 their hearts ? Then observe their vacant, devotion- 
 less looks ! 
 
 Indeed, if the endless prayers of the Roman Cath- 
 olic had the least sanctifying power, he could not 
 but be the purest of men. Yet observe the scenes 
 of abomination enacted at every holy lough and 
 well. Visit St. Patrick's well on midsummer eve — 
 see those crowds of devotees, with bare feet and tied 
 up heads, — some running in circles, some kneeling 
 in groups, some jumping about like maniacs, most 
 
218 THE GRAND CAUSE. 
 
 of them covered with dust and sweat, not a few with 
 | blood, and all taking incredible pains that neither 
 browsers nor petticoats shall protect their knees 
 • from the sharp stones : while from the whole crowd 
 ! a horrid din continues to rise to heaven. And you 
 call this devotion ! Then read the following pic- 
 ture, drawn by an eye-witness : — " Shouting, and 
 howling, and swearing, and carousing, filled up every 
 pause, and threw over the spot the air of hell. I 
 was never more shocked and struck with horror , 
 and perceiving many of them intoxicated with reli- 
 gious fervor and all-potent whiskey, and warming 
 into violence before midnight, at which time the dis- 
 traction was at its climax, I left this scene of hu- 
 man degradation in a state of mind not easily de- 
 scribed." Do you say the priests are not accounta- 
 ble for such scenes? Then read a little farther : — 
 u On this occasion, the Irish Catholic clergy were 
 the mad priests of these bacchanalian orgies — the 
 fomentors of fury, the setters on to strife, the mis- 
 chievous ministers of the debasement of their peo- 
 ple, lending their aid to plunge their credulous con- 
 gregations in ceremonious horrors."* Thus, under 
 their own priests' special direction, their very pray- 
 ers are made pretexts for sinning. Instead of being 
 a means of removing sin, they are made the purchase- 
 money for greater indulgence in it ; and their rounds 
 of devotion are designed to clear scores with the 
 Most High, in order to begin iniquity de novo ! 
 
 * M 'Gavin's Protestant, pp. 403, 404. 
 
ROME BLIGHTS Man's ETERNAL PROSPECTS. 219 
 
 But even supposing such things were not so, and 
 that the utmost we could charge on this church was 
 mere formality, you will please recollect what this 
 means. W hat would you call professions of penitence 
 which is not felt, and of desires for holiness which are 
 not cherished ? What else but a mockery — a lie 1 
 And this is presented to the Holy One, before whom 
 angels veil their faces — and as Rome's best service ! 
 So that unless He who denounced the Pharisees for 
 such guilty homage has since changed his mind — 
 unless He who abhors hypocrisy everywhere, accepts 
 it at his altar — unless the august Sovereign of worlds 
 takes pleasure in mummeries with which any mortal 
 would feel insulted — the worship of Rome mast be 
 an abomination in his eyes. If it were either pleas- 
 ing to God or profitable to man, would you not at 
 least see some signs thereof in the priests them- 
 selves 1 You say they " fast oft ;" well, to judge by 
 their portty forms, the exercise seems to agree with 
 them. You assert they keep Lent most scrupulous- 
 ly ; be it so, they seem to thrive as well on salt fish 
 as the three Hebrew children on pulse and lentiles. 
 You say their prayers are manifold — we deny it not ; 
 we see their Breviaries in their hands, even on the 
 tops of the coaches. But are they indeed God-fear- 
 ing-men ? — do their souls melt with the love of Jesus ? 
 Let our previous pages answer. There is only too 
 much reason to fear that many of them are infidels 
 in heart. " Do you know," asked a Kerry priest of 
 a gentleman well known to the author — " Do you 
 
220 THE GRAND CAUSE. 
 
 know what religion I am of? — you think me a Cath- 
 olic priest, but in reality I am a Mohammedan I 
 believe Mohammed was as good a teacher of morals 
 ^as Christ, and far more successful: when other 
 means failed, he employed the sword, and beyond a 
 doubt it is the best means of propagating morals and 
 religion ! !" Oh ! the judgment-day will reveal the 
 fearful process through which the mind of many an 
 intelligent priest lias passed, commencing with super- 
 stition, and ending in skepticism When he emerges 
 from Maynooth. we have little doubt of his fanatical 
 sincerity ; but once clear of its gloomy cloisters, it 
 would be strange indeed if some of the light which 
 surrounds him would not in course of time reach 
 his mind. We will admit that he believes much of 
 Rome's worst mummeries, for we know the " strong 
 delusions'' under which some are left. We will say 
 he sincerely thinks Rome can reverse the divine 
 aphorism, " To obey is better than sacrifice," and can 
 even make right wrong. We will allow that he is 
 convinced God is at certain times offended with 
 flesh meat, and propitiated by fish, and that the food 
 which is good on Thursday is pernicious on Friday. 
 We will grant that in all this and more, he may be 
 a devout believer. But hark ! — he is just telling 
 that trembling mother on whose brow sits distress, 
 that he has prayed her darling child a certain length 
 out of purgatory, but that it will need so many more 
 masses, which in Rome's vocabulary means so much 
 more money, to pray him wholly out. The poor 
 
ROME BLIGHTS MAN'S ETERNAL PROSPECTS. 221 
 
 creature believes him — but can he believe himself? 
 And will you call us uncharitable for suspecting that 
 man's honesty ? — a man whom one such act leaves 
 no choice between the character of a fanatical maniac 
 and that of a foul impostor — whose intellect super- 
 stition must have shattered, or else who must know 
 he is deceiving that poor woman, and driving a vil- 
 lanous trade on all that is tender and sacred in her 
 soul. 
 
 Fellow-Christians, what can you say to all this ? 
 Behold our degraded countrymen, with many of 
 whom the best hopes of heaven are the priest, and 
 the loftiest views of happiness, a drunken fit. Can 
 you say such creatures are meet for the angelic 
 throngs ? Then unless there is a purgatory, where 
 else must they go ? View that hoary wretch bend- 
 ing beneath the weight of crimes and years — his 
 hands perhaps stained with blood, and his priest the 
 keeper of the horrid secret. He will soon enter 
 eternity — as he is. What place is he fit for ? — 
 heaven? One starts at the thought. Is it a little 
 oil rubbed on the body of that dying and now un- 
 conscious sinner, that can purify his soul ? or even 
 if there were a purgatory, what more virtue could its 
 sufferings possess than those earthly penances, in 
 spite of which he lived a wretch ? And if he were 
 admitted to heaven, what would it serve him ? If 
 the whole Church of Rome were translated thither 
 bodily, as she is or ever was i:i her palmiest days, 
 what could this avail her. unless you suppose that 
 
222 THE GRAND CAUSE. 
 
 place to be the heaven of the poets of Greece or the 
 prophet of Mecca ? But if you grant it is a place 
 of transcendent holiness^ whose employments, and 
 enjoyments too. consist in serving God; then, what 
 happiness could it bring to a church which regards 
 virtue as a bore — absolution from it a blessing — the 
 Sabbath a weariness — and prayer a penance 1 Why, 
 such a heaven would be utterly insupportable to her 
 genuine votaries. Its bluoni would be dismal, and 
 its purity hateful to them. The holier its throngs, 
 they would be to them the more revolting ; the 
 sweeter its strains, they would grate the more harshly 
 on their ears ; and though to minister to their hap- 
 piness you could drain every cup, and rifle every 
 flower of paradise, you would still find them wander- 
 ing in misery through its bowers, sighing to escape 
 from its holy restraints, and regarding such a deliv- 
 erance as their highest heaven. 
 
 Can the reader ask farther proof that Rome 
 blights man's eternal prospects ? What then, he 
 may inquire, is there no salvation in that church 1 
 Adored be the living God, we believe there is. By 
 various arrangements, truly wonderful. He makes 
 some rays of heaven to struggle even through its 
 bars and gratings. That truth which Satan's cun- 
 ning has mingled with this system, the better to se- 
 duce therewith, God's infinite grace often makes the 
 means of saving ; and while many receive only the 
 error and perish, some receive along with it enough 
 of the truth to neutralize its deadly power Yes, 
 
ROME BLIGHTS MAN'S ETERNAL PROSPECTS. 223 
 
 many Roman Catholics are saved, but, think you, 
 does Home deserve the credit % — let her own con- 
 duct answer. Is it on her best or her worst men 
 that she has usually conferred her favors ? — which 
 class lias she thus iwoved to be most after her heart 1 
 — has she not almost as uniformly persecuted her 
 good men, as she lias canonized her bad ? You tell 
 us of Fenelon — we reply, that she banished him. 
 You speak of the Port-Royalists — do you know their 
 sad history ? You quote the name of Pascal — his 
 godly sister was hunted to death, and he died a 
 heretic, if papal bulls be true, and would have cer- 
 tainly died a martyr had he not slept in his tomb 
 ere the authorship of his " Letters" had transpired. 
 And you call these her children ? — her step-children 
 you mean. Yet it is with their good name she 
 would ofttimes fain perfume her foulness ; and it is 
 with their mantle that even " Protestant" pseudo- 
 liberals would sometimes seek to hide her deformity ! 
 Why do they not rather quote the men whom she 
 has delighted to honor ? Why won't they go to her 
 own authentic catalogue of canonized saints — of 
 those who in her judgment best deserved heaven — 
 such butchers, for instance, as Simon cle Montfort, 
 who figures in the list as the holy St. Dominic. 
 These are the men whom Rome lauds on earth and 
 sends to heaven ! Oh ! could they enter that blessed 
 place, retaining the character, and free to perpetrate 
 the crimes which procured their canonization, they 
 
224 THE GRAND CAUSE. 
 
 would soon wreck it of every vestige of its loveli- 
 ness, and convert it into a pandemonium. 
 
 And now, in conclusion, when we speak of Popery 
 as a Satanic conspiracy against the human soul, we 
 surely do not mean that its priests are in the plot — 
 they who are likely to be its worst victims — or that 
 they even know the work they are doing, and the 
 master they serve ? We are convinced that, in this 
 respect, they " know not what they do," that they as 
 little dream as their flocks of the master-mind which 
 presides over their system, and that, in this sense, at 
 least, : ' they be blind leaders of the blind." No ; 
 the plot is too deep even for Jesuitism to contrive ; 
 a greater than Loyola is here ; and it is this con- 
 spiracy against the soul that proves at once its pater- 
 nity and iniquity. If it only cursed our countrymen 
 for time, it were bad enough : yet this is the mere 
 underplot of this " master-piece of Satan." It is its 
 fearful distinction, that it traffics in " the souls of 
 men ;" that, not content with blasting them in time, 
 it pursues them through eternity ; not satisfied with 
 destroying them on earth, it shuts heaven against 
 them, follows them beyond that grave where wick- 
 edness usually ceases from troubling, and reserves 
 its most tremendous curse for that other world 
 whither ordinary hatred refuses to pursue ! 
 
 And now, fellow-Christians, we must not, cannot 
 leave this awful subject, without a word to you. Is 
 it really so that we nightly sleep calm on our pil- 
 low, while souls all around us are passing before the 
 
ROME BLIGHTS MAN'S ETERNAL PROSPECTS. 225 
 
 throne — their best preparation the unction of a 
 priest, and their fairest plea the merits of the Vir- 
 gin ? Have we lived for years amongst them, and 
 though often told of their danger, folded our arms 
 and shut our eyes, content with that specious plea 
 of indifference disguised in the robes of charity — 
 '* God is merciful V Or. if we have felt some Prot- 
 estant zeal, has it been kindled by the strange fire 
 of party strife full as much as by, the holy flame of 
 jealousy for God and love to souls? We implore 
 you to ponder this chapter on your knees. Others 
 may deny its truth but you. at least, admit it : in- 
 difference on your part. then, is left without excuse. 
 You know the unregenerate soul could not be happy 
 in heaven, cannot be truly happy anywhere ; — that, 
 could it roam creation in quest of felicity, it would 
 find the words emblazoned on every star it ap- 
 proached — ;i There is no peace to the wicked." 
 But. even could it be happy in heaven, you know it 
 were impious to suppose its admittance there. Satan 
 was hurled thence the moment he sinned : and could 
 one sinner enter its gates, his presence would hush, in 
 an instant, its myriad harps, and darken the brows 
 of its radiant throngs. Then, what insensibility holds 
 us back from greater exertion on behalf of Rome's 
 victims ? How many of them may, on that awful 
 day, plead our guilt in palliation of their own, and 
 cry, " Refuge failed us ; for these Christians would 
 not care for our souls !" Then, by the love of Him 
 who saved us. and commands us to make known 
 
 15 
 
226 THE GRAND CAUSE. 
 
 his salvation to others; by our own tremendous 
 responsibility as the keepers of our brethren's souls ; 
 and by the inestimable worth and unutterable dan- 
 ger of perishing millions, let us awake from our 
 stupor and fly to their rescue. Imagine, if yon can, 
 the obsequies of one lost soul! What, in compari- 
 son, is earth's most dreadful catastrophe? The 
 waves of Time's vast ocean, how soon they will 
 close over the world's most fearful shipwreck ! and 
 the historian will scarcely mark, by one passing sen- 
 tence, the spot where it occurred. But, oh, one 
 lost sour, ! Well might the infidel thus rebuke the 
 Christian, and exclaim. " Tf I believed the half of 
 what you say you believe. I would fly through the 
 world with the awful news ; — I would force my way 
 with it into every dwelling ; — I would make it ring 
 from every steeple, and float on every breeze ; — till 
 my tongue would cleave to my jaws, and exhausted 
 nature sink down and expire." 
 
PART IV. 
 THE CURE. 
 
 Thus have we traced the causes of Ireland's 
 wretchedness through their manifold complications ; 
 shown how they are like wheels within wheels : and 
 while estimating the share which various subordinate 
 causes have had in creating it, traced it to Popery 
 as the Grand Primary Source. That there are 
 other causes than Popery, we have therefore freely 
 acknowledged ; but we have proved that these are 
 either produced or aggravated by it. That there 
 may be others still, which the brevity of this work 
 has forbidden us to notice, we as freely allow : but 
 after making the most liberal discount on the score 
 of all these which can with the least reason be 
 demanded, still Popery stands out in such fearful 
 prominence, that they seem in comparison as the 
 drop of the bucket, or the chaff on the summer 
 thrashing-floor. 
 
 And to prevent the remotest possibility of a 
 fallacy in our argument, we have conducted it 
 through the twofold process of induction and deduc- 
 tion — of analysis and synthesis. Like some great 
 
228 THE CURE. 
 
 river, we have in our Second Part ascended the 
 dark stream of Ireland's woes to its source, and 
 found that to be her Religious state, marking as 
 we passed the principal tributaries. And then, to 
 put the case beyond cavil forever, we have in our 
 Third Part turned and sailed down the turbid 
 stream, and demonstrated not only that Popery is 
 its main channel, but that to it these tributaries 
 chiefly owe their existence, course, and power ; that, 
 to carry out the figure, it is the enormous valley 
 which it has in the course of ages scooped out. which 
 has of necessity reflected them towards it, and in- 
 creased their force, however distant their rise or 
 different for a time their direction. 
 
 And. that Rome might have nothing to complain 
 of, we have traced her through every age and land, 
 and still found her true to her own motto, Idem 
 semper ubiqve ; — that her whole course through the 
 moral heavens has been that of some blood-red 
 comet, wild and fearful. And we have drawn our 
 proofs of this, not from her old musty records, those 
 "relics of a barbarous age." as she would fain have 
 us regard them ; but from Rome herself, and espe- 
 cially as she now lives and moves in the full cos- 
 tume of those newest fashions with which she has 
 bedizened her haggard form, in hope to enamor 
 modern Christendom. 
 
 Nay, we have clone more still. Our manifold 
 facts and arguments we have based or. eternal laivs. 
 We have shown that there are certain laws, which, 
 
THE MYSTERY SOLVED." 220 
 
 being complied with, man must be happy, and being 
 disregarded, he mist be wretched in both worlds ; 
 that by nature we violate these, hence all the mise- 
 ries of earth and hell ; that true religion, by restor- 
 ing us to their dominion, blesses, and that false 
 religion, by disregarding them, curses in a thousand 
 ways. Now. we have seen that Romanism crosses 
 all those laws, and therefore must be a country's 
 curse and poison. Our argument is thus based on 
 eternal laws ; therefore to oppose it were as prepos- 
 terous as to oppose those sciences which rest on the 
 same foundation. And all the anathemas which 
 Rome can hurl against it, prove not its weakness 
 but her own, and resemble at best the impotent 
 attempt of the fabled Titans to storm the heavens 
 and dethrone the God of gods. 
 
 And thus every part of Ireland's great puzzle we 
 have solved. The mystery of her state we have laid 
 bare to the light of heaven ; and that so distinctly, 
 that the blindest eye can scarce help seeing every 
 chamber of its dark labyrinth, illumined by that 
 single word — Popery ; and the deafest ear can 
 scarce help hearing the doleful sound echoing from 
 every hill and valley, rock and stream, — Home is 
 
 THE GRAND CURSE OF IRELAND. 
 
 We now proceed to our last part — the Cure. But 
 as this has been already so clearly foreshadowed, it 
 will need neither elaborate nor lengthened examina- 
 tion. We shall sum up all we shall deem it needful 
 to say under the two heads of the Medicine and the 
 
230 THE CURE. 
 
 Treatment. And for the sake of greater clearness 
 and conclusiveness, we shall here also pursue the 
 double process of induction and deduction. And as 
 we have seen how clearly the cure has been fore- 
 shadowed in the cause, we beg the reader to notice, 
 as he proceeds, how remarkably every part of the 
 argument on the cause is confirmed and illumined 
 by each successive step in the cure ; and how, like 
 two reflectors, they thus shed on each other such a 
 flood of light as gives the entire demonstration the 
 radiant clearness of noonday. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 THE MEDICINE THE POPULAR REMEDIES. 
 
 Of the numberless pa?iaceas prescribed for Ire- 
 land, we think it necessaiy to notice only the follow- 
 ing. One class of men, full of her civil grievances, 
 propose legislation ; another, chiefly impressed with 
 her ignorance, preach education ; a third, looking 
 mainly at her natural richness and actual poverty, 
 <rv. develop her industrial resources; a fourth, in 
 view of her moral and religious degradation, declare 
 that the gospel is her only true remedy ; while a fifth 
 class, believing that each of these remedies is more 
 or less needed, say, let us have them all. We shall 
 briefly attend to the claims of each. 
 
THE MEDICINE THE POPULAR REMEDIES. 231 
 
 The Civil. — We have already proved that legis- 
 lation can do little for us. and that almost the only 
 ground which remains for it to occupy is the hind 
 question. We need some more sweeping measure for 
 the transfer of land than even the Encumbered Estates' 
 Bill ; a thorough reform of those ruinous Chancery 
 laws by which so many proprietors have doubtless 
 been beggared ; and, above all, a new and equitable 
 adjustment of the relation of landlord and tenant. 
 No one can doubt that the want of such an adjust- 
 ment has been fraught with evil, and it has. in a sec- 
 ondary sense, been the cause of many of our agrarian 
 crimes. It has done much to train our peasantry to 
 insubordination, and beget that chronic discontent 
 which now glooms on the brows of thousands of them. 
 It has caused many of our bloodiest murders. It has 
 furnished priests and demagogues with their best 
 text against the " Sassenach;" proved a screen for 
 Rome to hide her own desolations behind ; and thus 
 served to break the force of the demonstration that 
 she is Ireland's grand curse. It is desolating the 
 only fair, because the only Protestant, province in 
 Ireland ; provoking even its peaceful inhabitants to 
 outrage : and thus destroying that moral tone which 
 its gospel ministers have so carefully cultivated : and 
 how much more serious those outrages would now be 
 but for these gospel ministers, on whom some are dis- 
 posed to father them all, is pretty evident from the 
 fact that they are almost exclusively the work of 
 Ribbonmen. 
 
232 THE CURE. 
 
 And what lias this ruinous delay of a measure so 
 obviously just, gained for the landlord himself ? 
 Whereas he might now have been beloved and pros- 
 perous, at least in Ulster, amidst a grateful and 
 nourishing tenantry, he has done much to ruin both 
 himself and them. And those concessions which he 
 might once have easily made, and which then would 
 have saved all parties, he can now scarcely make 
 without beggaring himself. A fearful position ! 
 but how is it to be avoided 1 We are passing 
 through a social revolution : and the landlord who 
 has done so much to cause it, must just take his share 
 of its trials. It can save neither party, but must 
 eventually ruin both to continue to stave off this 
 question. It is idle to decry the tenant-right agita- 
 tion, or denounce its advocates as incendiaries and 
 communists. Were they all that is charged on them 
 — and some of them are far from faultless — this 
 would not affect the question an iota ; for it is not 
 with " Reverend Agitators," but great laws, you 
 have to contend. To Protection the country cannot 
 return. Therefore to Free Trade principles every 
 interest Must be adjusted. To apply them to pro- 
 duce and not to land, to some things and not to 
 others, is the only course which cannot he long per- 
 severed in. There is no help for it then ; the land- 
 lord must, like all other mortals, bow to great laws ; 
 and, as we have said, the longer the delay, the reck- 
 oning will be the more terrible. 
 
THE MEDICINE THE POPULAR REMEDIES. 233 
 
 But beyond a few such measures as the above, 
 civil remedies arc perfectly useless, and many of 
 them in our present state positively injurious. There 
 is a nonage in nations as well as individuals, during 
 which to invest them with political immunities were 
 like giving the child all the rights of a man : and a 
 corruption, too, which perverts into a curse the best 
 civil blessings, and during the continuance of which, 
 to confer them on a people is just to increase their 
 powers of mischief. And is not this the state of 
 multitudes in Ireland? Instance the basis of all 
 society — Truth. '■ As to finding out the truth." 
 says Mr. Inglis, " by the mere evidence of witnesses, 
 it is generally impossible. To save a relation from 
 punishment, or to punish one who has injured a re- 
 lation, an Irish witness will swear anything." And 
 lest this should be deemed the language of Protes- 
 tant " bigotry," hearken to their own champion, Dr. 
 Doyle : — " The witnesses as often labor to conceal, as 
 to manifest the truth ; — one class of them anxious to 
 defeat the law, the other only intent on procuring 
 conviction : both regardless of the obligation of an 
 oath, and perfectly indifferent about contributing to 
 the ends of justice."* Yet this is the man who, in 
 the very same letters from which this sentence is ex- 
 tracted, declares, that '•'• when it pleased God to have 
 an island of saints upon earth, He prepared Ireland 
 from afar for this high destiny. The Irish are, 
 
 * Letters of J. K. L. (Dr. Doyle), p. 22. 
 
234 THE CURE. 
 
 morally speaking, not only religious like other na- 
 tions, but entirely devoted to religion !"* 
 
 Does not this demonstrate, as we have already 
 shown, that in the minds of both priest and people, 
 piety and crime, prayer and perjury, are perfect- 
 compatibles, and that Rome's religion is a system of 
 magic, and never aims to improve the heart ? How 
 often have we ourselves seen justice paralyzed on 
 the 'bench, guilt escaping, innocence martyred, and 
 the entire trial made a mere farce by perjured vil- 
 lany ! Nay, how often is the priest himself the 
 guiltiest ; and, to quote the confession of counsel re- 
 garding his reverend client, who had been detected 
 in the very act, how often is he a " common perjurer," 
 and obliged " to leave the court a degraded man !"f 
 Talk of political immunities to such beings ! — in 
 whom are destroyed those moral obligations on 
 which all the value of such rights depends. And 
 would this be your cure for Ireland's evils ? You 
 could not inflict a greater curse on a corrupt nation 
 than to give them a code adapted only for a vir- 
 tuous one : for this were just to hold out a premium 
 to their profligaey, and increase their powers of mis- 
 chief. Political rights, to be blessings at all, must 
 be in hands which won't abuse them ; and however 
 their sound may catch the thoughtless crowd, and 
 suit the designing demagogue, slavery is better than 
 jutraged freedom. France might ere now have 
 
 * Letters of J. K. L. (Dr. Doyle), p. 58. 
 \ Report, Sligo Assizes, March 13, 1837- 
 
THE MEDICINE THE POPULAR REMEDIES. 235 
 
 taught us this much. Twice has she tried a repub- 
 lic ; and by the votes of three fourths of the nation, 
 she has not only confessed that she is unfit for free- 
 dom, but that military despotism is to her a blessing 
 in comparison. JNTations can only be governed by 
 moral or physical power. And if men's consciences 
 will not prevent them from robbing or murdering, 
 what else can you do but chain and fetter them ? 
 And when, as in our wretched land, Rome has so 
 debauched the moral sense as to leave moral influence 
 nothing to lay hold on, it is the most mischievous 
 folly that ever was heard of to propose as her cure 
 an increase of those immunities which her corruption 
 has already so fearfully abused. Hence despotism 
 always does, and always must, prevail in Popish 
 lands. There, there is no moral principle for moral 
 power to operate on ; and were our most ardent 
 champions of freedom made rulers there, they would 
 soon find their visions of liberty dispelled ; and that 
 in a corrupt community there is not a foot of stand- 
 ing-ground between despotism and anarchy, between 
 the chains of Loyola and the arms of Robespierre. 
 And is it not amazing that men have not long since 
 learned this ? Seventy-six years ago, Protestant 
 America became a free nation, and has ever since 
 enjoyed unexampled prosperity ; while, within the 
 same period. Popish France has twice passed through 
 the various phases of freedom, anarchy, and iron 
 despotism. Two goodly vessels ! The one, — her 
 chart, the Bible ; her ballast, virtue ; her compass, 
 
236 THE CURE. 
 
 true to the pole-star of heaven, — has been ploughing 
 her glorious way over Time's mighty waters, freight- 
 ed with blessings to all mankind. The other, with- 
 out compass, or ballast, or chart, with mutiny on 
 board and storms around, has been driven about 
 amongst shoals and breakers, a spectacle and terror 
 to the world ! Would that the exclamation of her 
 dying statesman rung in our own rulers' ears — 
 " France cannot do without a religion !" 
 
 But why argue the question thus ? Have we not 
 proved that, by the devices of Popery, the immuni- 
 ties which Protestant simplicity would extend to the 
 Papist, in hope to break his chains, are transformed 
 into means of binding them more firmly around 
 him ? — that to " extend the suffrage," for instance, to 
 the people, is just to increase the power of the 
 priests ? — and that while there are a thousand 
 Father Walshes to threaten all with " everlasting 
 punishment" who will not vote for the candidates of 
 their choice, our champions of " equal rights" are 
 only forging new chains for our countrymen, and 
 playing into the hands of the worst tyrants the world 
 ever saw !* Talk of civil rights beneath a system 
 whose Iiead thus sneers at man's chief birth-right ! 
 — " From this polluted fountain of indifference flows 
 that absurd and erroneous doctrine, or rather raving, 
 in favor and defence of liberty of conscience ;"f and 
 which raves, too, against that :: ever-to-be-detested 
 
 * Report of Select Committee on Bribery and Intimida- 
 tion, f Encyclical Letter of Gregory XVI., 1832. 
 
THE MEDICINE THE POPULAR REMEDIES. 237 
 
 liberty of the press," and would, if it dare, give the 
 world's best literature the doom of the Alexandrian 
 Library! A free Papist i Have you, then, forgot- 
 ten the confessional ? Other tyrants take cognizance 
 of your words and actions : but Popery penetrates 
 your bosom. Others have policemen at your door; 
 but it keeps a priest in'your heart. The Pope, with 
 las myriad confessors dispersed over the globe, is 
 both omnipresent and omniscient, and millions of 
 bosoms lie open to his gaze. Talk of political rights 
 beneath such an ubiquitous eye ! which watches 
 every government ; and wherever it can, makes kings 
 mere puppets, and premiers the wires to work them 
 by : — which looks in at every door, and so completely 
 murders family, and even conjugal confidence, that 
 no man can breathe freely by his own hearth, or 
 confide his secrets to the wife of his bosom ; — and 
 beneath whose dreadful glare the father sees the 
 brow of his innocent child growing darker each time 
 she has been to the confessional ! We protest, then, 
 against the folly of looking to Parliament for what 
 it cannot do ; of applying civil remedies to a moral 
 disorder ; of increasing the liberty of the people, 
 while their priests only turn it to an engine of sla- 
 very ; of curing our disturbances by enlarging the 
 powers of our surpliced disturbers ; or of causing 
 the olive-tree to flourish by strengthening the arms 
 that would pluck it up by the roots ! 
 
 The Educational. — On this subject there prevail 
 
2o6 THE CLUE. 
 
 in Ireland, as elsewhere, very conflicting opinions, — 
 one party opposing all education from which religion 
 is severed and another resisting all with which it is 
 united — the National Board being the symbol of the 
 latter, and hostility to it the characteristic of the 
 former. In both parties we have something to ap- 
 prove, but more to condemn. We object to the vio- 
 lent ultraism of the former. Forgetting that the 
 Board, if an evil, has at least displaced a greater 
 evil, the "hedge-school ; ; ' — that if a "curse," it is 
 chiefly of their own procuring — for had their system 
 wrought well, it had never existed ; there is a certain 
 class who seem to regard it as the Gnostics viewed 
 matter, and denounce it as fiercely as though it. not 
 Popery, were the grand apostasy, and Marlborough 
 Street, not Rome, were the seat of the Beast ! 
 Well, the impression somehow prevails, that this en- 
 mity does not wholly spring from heavenly motives, 
 but is as much prompted bv the spirit of Diotrephes 
 as that of Jesus. We ourselves cannot forget how 
 pertinaciously these men continue to assert, in the 
 face of all fact, that in Protestant schools connected 
 with the Board the use of the Bible is more re- 
 stricted than in those of their own Church Educa- 
 tion Society. 
 
 To the national system we know there is much to 
 object ; but while men like Mr. Trench patronize its 
 schools, we cannot regard it as the root of all evil ; 
 and when men like Dr. M'Neile eulogize its effi- 
 ciency, we cannot but regard it as the source of 
 
THE MEDICINE THE POPULAR REMEDIES. 239 
 
 some good. Thousands of Roman Catholics, who 
 but for it would now be sunk in hopeless darkness, 
 are rejoicing in a substantial education. And why 
 should these brethren seek to destroy a system 
 which, though not all they could wish, confers such 
 important benefits? If our countrymen won't have 
 all the knowledge we desire, shall we therefore give 
 them none? If they won't use the Bible at first 
 sight, shall we prevent them from ever being able: to 
 use it 1 If they won't instantly emerge from Roman 
 bondage, shall we therefore put it out of their power 
 ever to emerge/ On the plea of not violating our 
 consciences, shall we thus act a part which requires 
 the immolation of theirs, and, in the name of Prot- 
 estantism, seek their conversion by such Popish 
 compulsion ? And since we cannot conscientiously 
 aid the Board in enlightening a country whose dark- 
 ness is a disgrace to Christendom, must we not only 
 hinder those who can, but impugn their motives and 
 denounce their conduct 1 
 
 Besides, what is meant by this cry of " godless 
 knowledge ?" The sum of all knowledge is God and 
 his works — is it this they call godless? — and under 
 the plea of piety, are they guilty of profanity ? "All 
 his works praise" and reflect Him : and if we do not 
 see Him in every star and stream, the fault is not in 
 the book but the student. On all are marked the 
 footprints of the Creator ; and if learned men have 
 been infidels, it is not because, but in spite of their 
 pursuits. We protest, then, against this narrow- 
 
240 THE CURE. 
 
 minded attempt to set the God of grace against the 
 God of nature. It has been the fruitful source of 
 the infidelity which is complained of: shunning sec- 
 ular learning as an object of suspicion, we have left 
 her in the hands of wicked men. and if they have 
 sometimes perverted her testimony to their own bad 
 ends, the fault has been ours for leaving her with 
 them. Then we say — Flood Ireland with secular 
 knowledge; better this than none. All kinds of 
 light arc sisters, prismatic rays from the great Sun 
 of truth, and, though differing in their hues, yet con- 
 stituent parts of the same celestial element. Rome 
 hates all kinds of knowledge; and this alone might 
 teach those P-rotestants that all kinds are useful. 
 She knows well that secular and religious light are 
 as closely allied as civil and religious liberty, and 
 that all these conspire to elevate and bless ; and it is 
 deplorable that what Home sees so clearly. Protes- 
 tant imbecility cannot see, or Protestant bigotry will 
 not. They say they dread infidelity ! Should they 
 not, therefore, dread Popery more than the Board — 
 for what is infidelity but "an excrescence on the 
 back of the Beast?" What produced the entire 
 school of Voltaire .but this grand insult to the hu- 
 man understanding? And why dread Infidelity 
 more than Popery? Is not the former often the 
 inquirer's first resting-place on his journey from 
 Rome to Jerusalem? Infidels think — but Papists 
 can only believe ; which state, suppose you. is the 
 more hopeful one? And whether is Infidel France 
 
THE MEDICINE THE POPULAR REMEDIES. 241 
 
 or Popish Spain this instant more accessible to the 
 gospel missionary 1 But where is the monster brood 
 of infidels which it was predicted this Board should 
 bring forth ? Are not all wise men now beginning 
 to admit that it is going to be a grand engine for 
 the overthrow of Irish Popery ? — and the very best 
 proof is Rome's anxiety to get rid of it. It has 
 penetrated into her inmost camp, where the gospel 
 missionary could not have followed. It has dived 
 into her deepest dungeons : and, as it brings out her 
 victims to the light, should not we stand at the door 
 with the gospel to receive them? It is teaching 
 them to read — let us be ready, when it has done so, 
 to give them a Bible. It is springing the mine — 
 let us stand prepared, when all is ready, to lay the 
 train and put to the match. It is thus being over- 
 ruled as a pioneer of the gospel, by Him who makes 
 even the most imperfect plans of sinful men to sub- 
 serve his glorious designs ; and let not us, the min- 
 isters of that gospel, wrangle and split hairs, refus- 
 ing to avail ourselves of the good it may do, because 
 not clone in the mode we would approve : so shall 
 we best prevent the infidelity we dread, and most 
 effectually promote the Christianity we desire. 
 
 But still more are we opposed to the sentiments 
 of the opposite party, who would preach mere secu- 
 lar knowledge as Ireland's gospel. It is a strange 
 and ominous sign of these times, that from so many 
 of oil]' seminaries where all other good books are ad- 
 mitted, the best of books alone is excluded ; and that 
 
 16 
 
242 THE CURE. 
 
 in the circle of what is termed " useful knowledge," 
 religious knowledge is never embraced. In the 
 name of that Christianity which is man's best friend 
 for both worlds, we solemnly protest against this. 
 And is it thus you would propose to heal the com- 
 plicated maladies of Ireland ? Have not learning 
 and philosophy been already tried in various lands 
 and in all ages, and what have they done to purify 
 the social mass? Their utmost achievement has 
 been to throw an external decency — or splendor, if 
 you will — over the corruption, like the phosphor- 
 escence of decay ; but what have they ever done to 
 arrest the putrefaction itself? Look, ye idolaters 
 of mere education, to Greece and Rome, and was it 
 not when their learning had attained the loftiest 
 point that their virtue had fallen the lowest ? Cor- 
 ruption was sapping Rome amid the glories of the 
 Augustan age ; and troops of philosophers filled the 
 academy, while the degraded Athenians were selling 
 their country to Philip. Or look, if you will, to modern 
 France — France, which in knowledge stands next to 
 England, and lacks nothing but virtue to steady and 
 direct it. But, wanting this ballast, it is the abun- 
 dance of her sails which is ever threatening to swamp 
 her. Was it not her philosophers who brought on 
 the first revolution ; and what was the " Reign of 
 Terror," but the monster progeny of this unnatural 
 wedlock of learning and wickedness ? 
 
 We ask you then to enlighten our country, but 
 we ask you still more to make her virtuous — to 
 
THE MEDICINE THE POPULAR REMEDIES. 243 
 
 give her that knowledge which is power, but to give 
 her also a conscience to guide it withal — to endow 
 her with a " giant's strength" if you can, but also 
 with such principles that she will not " use it like a 
 giant." Is it by mere education you can do this ? 
 You propose to elevate Ireland — what, then, is the 
 task before you ? To give honesty to thieves, and 
 truth to liars, and diligence to idlers, and energy to 
 all — to banish perjury from our courts, robbery from 
 our dwellings, and murder from our highways — to 
 extinguish the fires of discontent, lay the demon of 
 rebellion and set up the reign of peace — and thus 
 to empty our jails and poorhouses, disband our 
 soldiers and police, and bring back to our shores the 
 tides of prosperity ! And are you serious in propos- 
 ing to do this by an alphabet and spelling-books % 
 Can you thus think to transform the schoolmaster's 
 rod into an enchanter's wand ? No ; we want knowl- 
 edge, it is true, but we want virtue more ; and till 
 we get this, even your boasted knowledge can confer 
 but half its benefits. Without this, you may enlarge 
 your jails, they will continue to fill them ; and mul- 
 tiply your police, they will elude or defy them ; and 
 increase your tribunals, they will outswear or outface 
 them ; and enact new laws, they will break or evade 
 them. Their chief disease is in the heart. It is 
 vain to confine your treatment to the head. Hence 
 it is not literature but "righteousness which will 
 exalt our nation," — not the Pierian spring, but the 
 
244 THE CURE. 
 
 "fountain of living waters," that can remove those 
 corruptions which cause its decay. 
 
 But even suppose our whole reasoning false, and 
 that schools could do more than their fondest admirers 
 ever fancied in their dreams, can you educate Ire- 
 land so long as Rome reigns over \il Will a church 
 whose empire is darkness thus give you peaceable 
 possession of one of her tfest-guarded provinces — a 
 church whose history is light read backwards — which 
 wherever it has the power, either arrests all knowl- 
 edge or perverts it to her own worst purposes ; and 
 which has been lately teaching the most obtuse 
 amongst ourselves, that the real fault of our colleges 
 is not their " godlessness," but their existence, and 
 that all her struggles for liberty to teach in her own 
 way, mean liberty not to teach at all ? It is the 
 veriest folly, then, to talk even of educating the Irish 
 Papist, unless you can destroy Irish Popery ; of il- 
 lumining Ireland unless 3^011 dissipate the Lethean 
 fog with which it has enveloped her ; or of enlight- 
 ening her people while immured in the vast cavern 
 of Popery, — with sentinel priests so blocking up its 
 mouth as to hinder either the escape of a prisoner or 
 the entrance of a ray ? 
 
 The Industrial. — Industrial training is fast be- 
 coming the favorite remedy. The rush of our empi- 
 rics has of late been from the parliament to the 
 plough ; and even from-the school-book to the sewed 
 muslin manufacture. Addressing our people thus, 
 
THE MEDICINE THE POPULAR REMEDIES. 245 
 
 they say, — You are the cause of your own miseries, 
 your existence is artificial, and your lives are a fic- 
 tion — your tradesmen's sons are gentlemen, and your 
 farmers' daughters ladies ; — there must be an end to 
 this : your young gentlemen must doff the sporting 
 jacket, and don the farmer's frieze, and turn aside 
 from their hounds to follow the plough ; your young 
 ladies must lay down their embroidery and take up 
 the keys, and transfer themselves with all speed from 
 the parlor to the kitchen. In short, you must alter 
 your entire mode of life — you must go clown into the 
 bowels of the earth, and bring up its minerals — ■ 
 spread yourselves over your bogs, and form peat 
 companies — go out upon the seas, and catch the cod 
 and herrings — build ships, and circumnavigate the 
 globe ; — in a word, turn Ireland into a workshop as 
 we have turned Britain, and then your country's mil- 
 lennium shall have dawned ! Here is their proposal ; 
 and to show that they are no visionaries, they would 
 have schools in every parish for agriculture, industry, 
 and trades of all kinds ; aided, of course, by ade- 
 quate grants, and superintended by competent man- 
 agers. 
 
 An exquisite dream this ! — we have dreamed it our- 
 selves. Yet we do not mean that it is all a dream. 
 Doubtless by enormous cost, prodigious trouble, and 
 ceaseless care, much could in this way be done for 
 Ireland ; and we therefore rejoice in every such 
 movement. We are thankful to those who would 
 dress one ulcer of our diseased country, even though 
 
246 THE CURE. 
 
 they leave untouched the Malady which has caused 
 it. But, alas ! such external applications can give 
 little relief. And while you are healing one erup- 
 tion, the rankling disease within is throwing out 
 others around it. We are so far agreed, that if you 
 would reclaim Ireland, you must first reclaim the 
 Irish ; that if you would develop the country's re- 
 sources, you must develop the people's energies ; — 
 and that any scheme which aims not at this, inverts 
 the order of things, and begins at the wrong end. 
 But you make no provision in your plan for what 
 we have proved to be Ireland's chief 'want. You have 
 given her the head and the hands, it is true, but you 
 have not given her the heart and conscience. Her 
 people want honesty, energy, steadiness, perse- 
 verance. Is it by lessons on embroidery and farm- 
 ing you propose to implant these principles 1 Yet 
 without them, of what ultimate avail is anything 
 you can do % You may build factories — perhaps 
 your own workmen will burn them ; and establish 
 trades — your own journeymen may combine against 
 you ; and make what improvements you may — it is 
 too likely your clerks will deceive you, your custom- 
 ers rob you, your servants take advantage of you 
 whenever they can : and after years of the most 
 anxious toil, you will too probably find that your 
 best plans have been frustrated, and your money put 
 into a " bag with holes," and be compelled to retire 
 in disgust from the scene ! You think this too 
 gloomy a prediction ? Alas ! it is not prophecy at 
 
THE MEDICINE THE POPULAR REMEDIES. 247 
 
 all — it is well-known history. What else has been 
 the fate of most of the philanthropic schemes of which 
 Ireland has already been the scene ? Who does not 
 know that in our present state, the best men come 
 here only to peril their fortunes, and their most gen- 
 erous efforts are often turned into evils ? Those 
 who give are forgotten — those who lend are not al- 
 ways repaid — those who trust are imposed on — and 
 those who confide their capital to Irish hands, often 
 find it squandered in rash speculation or fraudulent 
 jobs. And why 1 — because Popery and prosperity 
 are elements as incompatible as fire and water. For 
 apart altogether from the direct intermeddling of the 
 priest, whose favor you cannot expect but at the price 
 of truckling subserviency, and whose endless annoy- 
 ances you cannot prevent, so long as the people you 
 operate on are his slaves, and know of no other crim- 
 inality but that of displeasing him — apart, we say, 
 from this altogether, you will find yourselves in the 
 midst of a deluge of depravity, contending against 
 the most hopeless odds ; and even when you think 
 you have found some standing ground, it will most 
 probably turn out to be a shaking bog or a trembling 
 quicksand. 
 
 We say, then, to our industrial economists, your 
 scheme, too, is radically defective. You may teach 
 the people industry, will they practise it 1 You may 
 invoke its spirit, will it come at your call 1 You 
 may bring railways to every town, and canals 
 through every parish, and reclaim our bogs, and 
 
248 THE CURE. 
 
 deepen our rivers, and drain our whole country to 
 its mountain tops, will this implant those great 
 moral principles on which the value and permanence 
 of all such improvements depend 1 You have given 
 the machinery, it is true, but where is the moving 
 power 1 And you have your choice either to con- 
 tinue working it yourselves, or see it stop and go to 
 ruin as soon as you withdraw. And at the very ut- 
 most you can only by such means make Ireland like 
 one of your large Asylums, with its grounds beauti- 
 fully laid out, and its inmates working here and 
 there ; but all superintended by other hands, and 
 supported by general charity. No ; Ireland wants 
 something that mere industry cannot supply, ay, and 
 without which it cannot exist. We are thankful for 
 your well-meant exertions, but they can only palli- 
 ate, they cannot cure. And oh ! how often have we 
 looked with sorrowful interest on those schemes of 
 mere worldly benevolence which are now going for- 
 ward here and there through our country, and 
 mourned to think that, for want of that moral ele- 
 ment which alone can give them permanence, they 
 must sooner or later come to naught ! And we 
 have been reminded the while of the child's frail 
 embankments on the sandy shore, which are doomed 
 to vanish before the flowing tide ! 
 
 The Scriptural. — It is truly mournful to be 
 obliged to prove that God's remedy for Ireland is 
 the best : — in this nineteenth century, the brightest 
 
THE MEDICINE THE POPULAR REMEDIES. 249 
 
 era of the gospel's triumphs — and in this United 
 Kingdom, the richest storehouse of its trophies — to 
 have to go over the argument anew, as if Paul were 
 only setting out on his first journey. Nor can we 
 imagine a more humiliating fact, than that Britain 
 owns not a few statesmen, and philanthropists, too, 
 win), while they call" themselves Christians, seem to 
 think a people's religion has as little to do with their 
 prosperity as the color of their hair ; nay. who speak 
 of the gospel as though it were some superior kind 
 of superstition, fitted for weak but not for manly 
 minds, or at best some n^stie thing designed for 
 the dying rather than for the living, and suited to 
 the cloister, but unfitted for the world ; and who 
 even smile at the (< bigot" who would assert that 
 God knows best what " exalts a nation," and retail 
 with baptized lips those sneers at the " foolishness 
 of preaching," which used to be confined to heathen 
 cynics ! 
 
 At a late meeting of poor-law guardians in Con- 
 nauo'ht. a Roman Catholic member of the board 
 boldly declared his belief — of course, amid cries of 
 "order" from the priests and their minions — that 
 the Bible was the secret of Ulster's prosperity, and 
 that nothing else would elevate the other provinces. 
 What an affecting circumstance ! Was the poor 
 man led to make this remark by some such instinct 
 as guides other creatures to select the aliment which 
 suits them best ; or merely by the feeling which 
 prompts the blind man wishfully to turn his dark 
 
250 THE CURE. 
 
 eyeballs to the sun when he hears all nature around 
 him rejoicing in his morning beams 1 
 
 We have already demonstrated that to nothing 
 else than the Bible can Ulster owe its vast superior- 
 ity. The subjoined tables show that nearly five 
 sixths of all Ireland's Bible and Sunday-school in- 
 struction are confined to that single province.* Ac- 
 cording, therefore, to those priestly blasphemers who 
 pronounce the Bible the " gospel of the devil,"f Con- 
 naught should be a paradise and Ulster a pandemo- 
 nium : and what must be the effrontery, to say noth- 
 ing of the wickedness, of the men who, though per- 
 fectly aware that the reverse is nearer the truth, rave 
 on against this volume as they have never raved 
 against " The Age of Reason ?" We are told, it is 
 true, with an air of triumph, that many Protestants 
 are as bad as Roman Catholics. We admit the fact, 
 
 * Sunday-School Society for Ireland. 1851. 
 
 Number Number Number of gratuitous 
 
 Provinces. of schools. of scholars. 
 
 teachers. 
 
 Ulster, . . 1931 . . . 164635 . . . 
 
 14151 
 
 Leinster, . 457 . . . 32314 . . . 
 
 3006 
 
 Munster, . 400 .. . 17160 . . . 
 
 1774 
 
 Connaught,. 216 .. . 12403 . . . 
 
 822 
 
 Hibernian Bible Society, 1851. 
 
 
 Bibles, Testaments, and Portions. 
 
 
 Sales. Grants. 
 
 Total. 
 
 Ulster, . . 1424 . . . 15408 . . . 
 
 16832 
 
 Leinster, . 224 . . . 2911 . . . 
 
 3135 
 
 Munster, . 160 .. . 930 .. . 
 
 1090 
 
 Connaught,. 186 .. . 3667 . . . 
 
 3853 
 
 f Encyclical Letter of Leo XII., 1824 
 
 
THE MEDICINE THE POPULAR REMEDIES. 251 
 
 but are they Bible-loving Protestants? This is the 
 point, for Rome's quarrei is with the Bible, and 
 ''the Bible is the religion or Protestants." If 
 these godless Protestants are Bible readers y a,nd our 
 godly ones Bible haters, then will we admit the force 
 of the objection ; for the grand point in dispute is, 
 Does the free circulation of the Scriptures do good 
 or harm ? But if, as is perfectly notorious, our god- 
 less Protestants are as innocent of the crime of Bible 
 reading as any priest could wish them ; if their reli- 
 gion is that mere formalism which is essential Popery 
 beneath whatever name ; if the virtue of every per- 
 son is just as his love to the Bible ; and finally, if 
 that parish is always the most virtuous which has 
 been longest blessed with a Bible-loving ministry, 
 and that always the least so which has been longest 
 cursed with Bible-neglecting hirelings ; — then is this 
 objection the strongest corroboration of our ivhole 
 argument. For it proves that such godlessness is 
 owing, not to the Bible, but to the ivamt of it, and 
 therefore not to the presence but to the absence of 
 true Protestantism. And it effectually confirms 
 our position, that where Popery is most intense there 
 is the deepest degradation, and where Protestantism 
 is most pure there is the highest elevation ; and, 
 therefore, that when Papists are bad, it is because of 
 their system, and when Protestants are bad. it is in 
 spite of theirs. We will now add, that the godless 
 Protestantism which is complained of is owing much 
 to the corrupting atmosphere of Popery, and the 
 
252 THE CURE. 
 
 u virtuous Popery" which is gloried in, to the anti- 
 septic power of Protestantism ; for is it not noto- 
 rious that our worst Protestants are generally found 
 in the most Popish districts, arid our best Roman 
 Catholics in the most Protestant? What different 
 things are the Roman Catholics, ay, and the Prot- 
 estants, too, of Ulster and of Connaught respective- 
 ly ! For in the one province grows a moral upas- 
 tree, and even Protestants suffer by its deadly emana- 
 tions ; in the other grows the tree of life, and even 
 Roman Catholics, who will not taste its fruit, are 
 the better for dwelling beneath its shade. Here is 
 the solution, and there can be no other. You have 
 in our country two atmospheres, a pestilent and a 
 pure one. generated by the Breviary and the Bible 
 respectively, and commingled in different proportions 
 in our various provinces. The pestilent predomi- 
 nates as you go south and west, and the pure as you 
 come north : and the moral health of all denomina- 
 tions is affected in exact proportion to the quantity 
 they breathe of each. 
 
 Yet ignorant depravity asks to this hour, What 
 has the Bible to do with Ireland's elevation ? How 
 can any man read it, and doubt that the only thing 
 necessary to make the whole earth a paradise is just 
 to follow its instructions? How could men, for 
 example, obey the golden rule, and " do to others as 
 the} 7 would have others do to them ;" or the two 
 great commandments, and " love G-od supremely, 
 and their neighbors as themselves," without bring- 
 
THE MEDICINE THE POPULAR REMEDIES. 253 
 
 ing back the innocence of Eden? Will any man 
 hazard his character for sanity by venturing to deny 
 this ? Why, our most florid conceptions of the change 
 which would follow the universal reign of such prin- 
 ciples, are meagreness itself. Is it not perfectly 
 obvious, that beneath their sway every demon of 
 vice and crime must fly back to the pit whence he 
 came : and that in the atmosphere they would create, 
 man would attain his loftiest moral stature, his stunt- 
 ed mind its largest growth, his shrivelled heart its 
 divinest expansion, and therefore his earthly habita- 
 tion its highest pitch of improvement ? Yet the 
 Bible has nothing to do with a nation's greatness J ! 
 Had it ever once failed to elevate, or had mere 
 worldly expedients ever succeeded without it, then 
 might there be some excuse for this stolid skep- 
 ticism. But what have the best schemes of mere 
 philosophy; philanthropy, or political economy ever 
 yet done to stay the crimes or tears of mankind? 
 Why, human wickedness has laughed to scorn, and 
 human woe has only been mocked by such paltry 
 expedients. While men have been wrangling about 
 their measures, whose only good provisions, if any 
 such they contained, were borrowed or pilfered from 
 the Bible, that book has in reality been maintaining 
 the chief struggle with the world's corruptions, and 
 diffusing those principles which, just as they pre- 
 vail, supersede the necessity of laws, and without 
 which mere statutes could no more control the 
 
254 THE CURE. 
 
 agents of crime, than fetters and chains would bind 
 the demoniac ! 
 
 We make our proud appeal to facts. A few 
 illiterate fishermen go forth from the banks of Jor- 
 dan on an errand so seemingly wild, that men knew 
 not whether most to pity their Ci insanity," or punish 
 their ' : presumption." Yet somehow, by their story 
 of " one Jesus," the most colossal fabrics of idolatry 
 were strewn in fragments, the thrones of monarchs 
 trembled, and the world was revolutionized ! 
 
 A solitary monk once disentombed a Bible from 
 the sepulchre to which Rome had so long consigned 
 it ; and, as at the resurrection of its divine Author, 
 its " keepers became as dead men ;" the " Triple 
 Tyrant" trembled on the banks of the distant 
 Tiber ; his mighty fabric of superstition was crack- 
 ed and riven as though struck by the bolts which 
 shattered Babel ; and Europe looked out as from a 
 new creation ! Or look, ye moral reformers, to that 
 uproarious village, remarkable for nothing but its 
 vice and misery ! You have exhausted your nos- 
 trums on it, and how much have you done ? Stand 
 aside, then, and make way for that unlettered itiner- 
 ant, whom some call an enthusiast, and others a 
 fanatic, — a man who knows no language but his own, 
 nor scheme of reform but that of salvation, in whom 
 the love of Christ and souls supplies the learning 
 of Greece and Rome, and England too ! Observe 
 how lie goes to work, for it is worth your notice. 
 His sole weapon, a Bible ; his chief agency, schools 
 
THE MEDICINE THE POPULAR REMEDIES. 255 
 
 and prayer-meetings ; his church, a barn ; his audi- 
 tors, rude villagers ; perhaps his only orders, " the 
 love of Christ constraineth me ;" and his manner, 
 possibly such as to shock the slave of frigid canon- 
 ical decorum. Yet that man in time transforms 
 that village ! — the tavern is exchanged for the house 
 of God, the bacchanal song for the evening hymn ; 
 and should you pass through its quiet streets, as the 
 summer evening sunbeams linger on the neighboring 
 hills, you could scarce help exclaiming, What en- 
 chanter has been here ? Do you still hesitate to 
 believe that the Bible did all this, and give most 
 of the glory to your civilized institutions? Then 
 behold that band of missionaries ploughing their 
 trackless way to some distant cannibal island, 
 and see how in time one and another of those 
 wild savages, whom nothing else could tame, un- 
 dergoes the most complete transformation ! But 
 why need we proceed 1 What has any land ever 
 been but a field of blood and crime till the Bible 
 has dispelled the sulphurous clouds with which hell 
 had shrouded it, roused its people from the Lethean 
 slumbers in which Satan had bound them, cleared 
 its moral soil of a thousand poisonous weeds, and 
 sowed instead the seeds of numberless improve- 
 ments? And hence, where but in Bible lands will 
 you find arts flourishing in fullest bloom, science 
 shedding its purest rays, or benevolence dispensing 
 its divinest blessings? Or what else has made 
 Britain the queen of nations, and the theatre of 
 
256 THE CURE. 
 
 wonders, with her thousand trees of life and liberty 
 waving in the breeze and spreading to the sun? 
 Yes, compared with the Bible as a mere civilizcr, 
 how contemptible the best schemes of statesman- 
 ship ! for they can only repress the crimes which it 
 eradicates, and punish the atrocities it wholly pre- 
 vents. And what proves its marrelloiis power is, 
 that even where it does not convert, it at least 
 moralizes and restrains ; where it does not give 
 life to the dead mass, it at least retards its putre- 
 faction ; where it does not clothe the moral waste 
 with verdure, it at least warms its atmosphere, and 
 lessens its dreariness ; — insomuch that each sanctu- 
 ary it rears has ever proved like the light-house on 
 the ocean's verge, which not only gives light to its 
 own attendants, but sends its struggling rays far out 
 over the gloomy wave ! 
 
 Such is the fact ;. and here we might rest and leave 
 our Christian philosophers to sneer on in their piti- 
 able blindness at Grod's glorious plan " for the heal- 
 ing of the nations." But we shall now meet them on 
 their own ground, and demonstrate the matchless wis- 
 dom and power of the gospel as an engine of social 
 elevation ; and prove that before it all other reme- 
 dies for Ireland, or any other land, must hide their 
 diminished heads in despicable insignificance, and 
 facie as the stars before the rising sun ; and that in 
 reality it were as rational to commence a new 
 search for the philosopher's stone, or the elixir of life, 
 as to expect any other cure for our country's maladies 
 
THE MEDICINE THE GRAND SPECIFIC. 257 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 THE MEDICINE THE GRAND SPECIFIC. 
 
 Doubtless one cause of the unbelief above re- 
 ferred to is, that men do not see the reasons of the 
 Cross, or never think it has reasons ; but deem it 
 some sort of magical thing which saves because God 
 has appointed it to save, but in which there is no 
 more connection between the disease and the remedy, 
 than between the Rod and the Red Sea. What 
 amazing ignorance ! to suppose that God, whose 
 matchless contrivances and adaptations pervade ev- 
 erything else, excludes them here, where they are 
 most perfect ! Dear reader, it is impossible, in a 
 few brief pages, to give full drawings of a plan so 
 glorious — to conduct you through all the chambers 
 of a structure so magnificent. We can only intro- 
 duce you to the porch of this glorious temple, give 
 you a mere glimpse of the interior, and then leave 
 you to pursue your discoveries for yourself. Be 
 good enough, then, to refer to our first principles, in 
 page 109; and as we have found how Popery sets 
 them all at defiance let us now see how perfectly 
 the gospel embodies and develops them. We have 
 found that love to God and our neighbor is the sum 
 of the decalogue, and therefore of all virtue. We 
 shall now briefly prove that every form of personal 
 and social happiness springs from this twofold com- 
 
 \1 
 
258 THE CURE. 
 
 mand, just as branches issue from their stem, — that 
 on this simple and glorious pedestal, the moral uni- 
 verse stands, and that it can rest upon no other. 
 
 The Philosophy. — I. Love to God and each 
 other is the sure source, and the only one of endlessly 
 increasing virtue and happiness amongst all rational 
 creatures. There are but two kinds of government 
 under which God could have placed the universe — 
 the reign of fear and the reign of love, and it is only 
 the latter which can secure these results. 
 
 1. Love alone can secure virtue — and it does so 
 most perfectly. What without it may be done from 
 a cold sense of duty, and is therefore some day but 
 too likely to be neglected, we are in no danger of 
 overlooking, so long as love strongly impels us. 
 Could I wrong a beloved brother, or disobey a parent 
 dear as my own soul? Therefore, if God would 
 have every duty to himself and to our neighbor ob- 
 served, he has only to inspire love to himself and 
 our neighbor, — mid it is done. 
 
 2. Love alone can secure happiness — and it does 
 so most perfectly. What even in this cold world is 
 our source of purest enjoyment? Is it the acquisi- 
 tion of earth's richest spoils, or the bliss of loving 
 and being loved — our " house full of silver and gold." 
 or full of domestic affection — our hearts throbbing 
 to the voice even of flattering fame, or the far sweeter 
 tones of one too fond and faithful to flatter? So 
 freely does the heart resign itself to the potent spell 
 
THE MEDICINE THE GRAND SPECIFIC. 259 
 
 of this delightful affection, that not only have poets 
 sung, and even sages felt its charms, but the deepest 
 depravity seems scarce able wholly to dispel them ; 
 and men have smiled over their infant's cradle, and 
 wept over their mother's grave, long after they have 
 ceased to weep or smile over any other spot on earth. 
 Therefore, if Grod would make his universe happy. 
 He has only to fill it with love, — and it is done. 
 
 3. Love alone provides for the endless increase of 
 virtue and happiness, and it does so most perfectly. 
 Mark, first, the necessary effect of love to God. 
 That blessed Being centres in himself infinitely more 
 goodness than is distributed to all his creatures. It 
 is therefore most obvious, that the more they know 
 and experience his goodness, the more they must 
 love Him, and the more must their virtue and hap- 
 piness increase, of course. Observe, next, the effect 
 of love to each other ; it would naturally exhibit 
 itself in a thousand acts of mutual kindness — these, 
 reciprocated, would call forth renewed acts of affec- 
 tion, until it would become a conflict with all which 
 could do the other most good. Now, you have only 
 to imagine myriads of creatures the subjects of such 
 constant and increasing love, and employed in all 
 those schemes of amelioration, which, as their end- 
 lessly growing knowledge would enable, so their 
 endlessly growing love would prompt them to devise ; 
 and you have at once get agoing a train of influences 
 which in their manifold forms and combinations 
 must produce an amount of bliss and advancement 
 
260 THE CURE. 
 
 which baffles all conception. Such, then, is the 
 glorious platform on which Grod has reared his uni- 
 verse. And such was man's condition before the 
 fall. His soul the seat of angelic love, was the seat 
 also of angelic virtue and happiness, and contained 
 the germ of angelic improvement. 
 
 II. Love to God and each other is peculiarly ne- 
 cessary to the virtue and happiness of the human 
 race. We have hearts — and to be happy, must love 
 some object. We have minds — and that object 
 must be capable of engaging them. We are spirits. 
 and immortal — that object must therefore be im- 
 mortal and spiritual. Our minds and hearts are 
 formed for endless growth — that object must be 
 capable of satisfying these endlessly increasing de- 
 mands upon it. While it must be able to supply all 
 our ivants, as well as suit all our capacities. We 
 are weak — it must be able to impart strength ; and 
 changing — it must never change ; in short, it must 
 be an object independent of all vicissitudes, and 
 adapted to all times, places, and circumstances. 
 Finally, as we are many, dwelling together, aiad re- 
 quired to love each other, it must be such an object 
 that each can have enough without diminishing the 
 supplies of the rest, else you introduce a fatal ele- 
 ment of discord amongst us : and if, instead of thus 
 endangering, you would ensure our mutual concord, 
 it must be such an object, that in giving of it en- 
 riches even the giver himself. Now, all these re- 
 quisites are found in Gtod alone. He is a spirit — 
 
THE MEDICINE THE GRAND SPECIFIC. 261 
 
 immortal, immutable, almighty, all-wise, containing 
 in himself such boundless excellence as must enrap- 
 ture the mind and rivet the heart, no matter how 
 inconceivably expanded they may become. And our 
 possessions of love to Him — that truest wealth, in- 
 stead of diminishing, increase the stores of others. 
 We have only to tell them of His goodness in order 
 to increase their love, and by a blessed reaction to 
 increase our own ! 
 
 III. The violation of this law of love must con- 
 sequently entail on the human race endlessly in- 
 creasing sin and misery. Alas ! man has made 
 the fearful experiment, and what have been the 
 results? Formed to find happiness only in God, 
 we have, by transferring our affections to earthly 
 objects, crossed the laws of our being at a thousand 
 points ; and the necessary consequence has been 
 individual misery and social disorder. Being 
 spirits, no amount of earthly things can satisfy us. 
 With minds and hearts craving after endless expan- 
 sion, these cravings are disappointed, and we are 
 thrown back upon ourselves. And setting our affec- 
 tions on objects, -which even, if otherwise satisfying, 
 change and decay, we ensure our wretchedness be- 
 yond the possibility of escape. Our laurels wither 
 on our brow — our friends die in our embrace — our 
 sweetest pleasures pall the soonest — our costliest 
 treasures are often the first to perish ; and as a fit 
 conclusion to a conflict so unequal with the laws of 
 G-od and of our own being, at length comes death to 
 
262 THE CURE. 
 
 strip us of whatever may have yet escaped the wreck 
 of changing life. Then the inordinate love of such 
 objects ensures social disorder ; for the more wealth 
 and power one enjoys, the less remains for others. 
 There could scarce be a dozen of Napoleons, nor a 
 hundred Rothschilds on earth ; and even if there 
 could, the dozen would enslave, and the hundred 
 would beggar the world. Now, does not this shed 
 a sunbeam of light on the cause of every nation's 
 miseries? It is just the inordinate love of such 
 objects as riches, honors, and pleasures, with the 
 violence and wrong it produces, which has drenched 
 the world with tears and blood. And you have 
 only to recollect that this is the exact condition of 
 our wretched country, to explain in an instant its 
 crimes and miseries. 
 
 IV. It follows unavoidably from the foregoing 
 propositions, that the only possible way effectu- 
 ally to restore virtue and happiness to any country, 
 is therein to restore love to its ancient sway. Now, 
 this is simply the object of the glorious gospel. We 
 have demonstrated that the law of love must secure 
 individual and social virtue, happiness, and pros- 
 perity; and that its violation must entail equally 
 extensive crime, misery, and desolation. It follows, 
 therefore, that until it is restored to the hearts of 
 men, these evils must continue ; and all the efforts 
 of statesmen and philanthropists can without this, 
 
 But <; skin and film the ulcerous part, 
 While rank corruption, mining all within, 
 Infects unseen." 
 
THE MEDICINE THE GRAND SPECIFIC. 263 
 
 Now, it is this restoration which the gospel effects, 
 and HENCE its matchless power, as a remedy for 
 national maladies. But in order to this restoration, 
 two things are indispensable. 
 
 1. God's laws being infinitely perfect, their viola- 
 tion must be an infinite crime, and therefore demand- 
 ing an infinite punishment. Of course, for God to 
 let such crime pass unpunished, were not only to 
 invite rebellion and overturn his throne, but to for- 
 feit all claim to the character of justice and truth. 
 Not even an earthly sovereign could permit his laws 
 to be trampled on without bringing contempt on 
 himself and anarchy on the country ; and for God 
 to do so, were to destroy his character, and with it 
 the confidence, and therefore the fove, and hence the 
 virtue and happiness of his entire creation. So that 
 the pardon of the rebellious part of his dominions 
 (perhaps a very small part), could only be effected 
 by destroying the whole and blasting his own per- 
 fections. But how could a sinner bear such a pun- 
 ishment? It is clearly impossible. God must pro- 
 vide some one who can bear it, or we are undone.* 
 Indeed, so utterly unable are we to make any repa- 
 ration for our sins, that if God could accept one 
 hour's obedience as atonement for a whole life's dis- 
 obedience, we have it not to give — not only because 
 our supreme love to God being due every hour upon 
 its own account, one hour's intermission of it can 
 
 * Acts iv. 12 ; Rom. III. 23-28 ; Gal. III. 10-14. 
 
264 THE CURE. 
 
 never be overtaken, but because no mere sinner 
 loves God at all even for a single moment* 
 
 2. Suppose such an atonement made, then our 
 hearts must by some divine agency be restored to 
 the dominion of that law of love in which virtue 
 and happiness alone are found. Without this, even 
 a\ atonement would be vain. While our hearts 
 are placed on earthly things, mere pardon could not 
 make us either virtuous or happy. But let heaven- 
 ly affections only displace the earthly — let the heart, 
 from being torn with restless passions, become the 
 serene seat of ethereal purity and angelic love, aud 
 you sow once moke the seeds of endlessly increasing 
 individual and social virtue, happiness, and improve- 
 ment. 
 
 Now, is it not self-evident, that did the above 
 principle of love universally prevail, the earth would 
 return to its Eden innocence, and therefore resume 
 its Eden loveliness? — and that the degree in which 
 it does prevail in any country, must indicate the de- 
 gree of that country's happiness and prosperity ? 
 It must be so, if we can trust our reason. It is so, 
 if we can trust our experience. For thousands can 
 testify that this love to God and man is no mere 
 dream of enthusiasm ; and millions who think so 
 still must own, that to such enthusiasm the world 
 owes its best blessings. To be plain — this is Chris- 
 tianity if the Bible is true, and must be if God is 
 perfect. That blessed religion tells us, that love is 
 * Rom. viii. 7 ; James iv. 4. 
 
THE MEDICINE THE GRAND SPECIFIC. 265 
 
 the grand law of the moral universe, whose obedi- 
 ence secures perfect virtue and happiness ; that man 
 has violated this law, and hence the crimes and mis- 
 eries which desolate his abode ; and that the grand 
 object of the gospel is to restore in his heart the do- 
 minion of this law as the onlv way to restore virtue 
 and happiness. That in order to this, the blessed 
 Saviour died to atone for his sins,* and the Divine 
 Spirit is sent to turn him from his sins ;f and that 
 through the work of both, and that alone, we are de- 
 livered from sin's punishment and power £ if we only 
 repent and believe on Jesus ;§ and that by this di- 
 vine agency that great inward change commences, 
 which, just as it goes on, restores more perfectly the 
 sway of that law of love, whose observance or breach 
 insures all good or evil. 
 
 Such, then, is a very meagre sketch of this match- 
 less plan, and that we had space left to show the 
 equal wisdom of the mode of its application ! — to 
 show that in all respects -there is as perfect an adap- 
 tation between the cross of Jesus and the heart of 
 man. as between the light of heaven and the eye it 
 enters. But we have only time to state the fact. 
 Like some medicine which is so compounded as to 
 act on every organ at once, He who has made the 
 heart of man has made his blessed gospel to touch 
 every chord of it, wake an echo through every cham- 
 
 * Rom. iii. 24 ; iv. 25. f John iii. 5 ; 1 Thess. v. 23. 
 
 t Eph. ii. 8, 9 ; Titus iii. 5, 6. 
 
 § Mark i. 15 ; Acts iii. 19 ; xxii. 31. 
 
266 THE CURE. 
 
 ber of it, grasp every power and rouse every feeling 
 of it ; — and this so universally, that Chalmers in Scot- 
 land, and Walker in England, and the Moravians in 
 Greenland, all declare that whereas other schemes 
 of amelioration they tried but in vain, they no soon- 
 er preached salvation to the sinner through Jesus' 
 blood, than this waked emotions which had slept till 
 then, and one and another was melted and changed. 
 And this has been the experience of all Christian 
 men — that the gospel is the true and only catholicon ; 
 that as the magnet attracts every particle of iron, 
 however different its shape, or size, or place of con- 
 cealment, so is there a something in Jesus which, 
 when he is lifted up, draws all men unto him ; and 
 that as the breeze of heaven wakes the melody of a 
 thousand Eolian harps, how different soever their 
 form and tone, whose music sleeps until swept by it, 
 so the story of Christ's amazing love wakes, in 
 breasts of the most diverse characters, responses 
 which nothing else could stir ! 
 
 And thus appears clear as heaven's sunshine the 
 secret of the gospel's amazing power on the nations. 
 Love is just to the moral universe what Attraction 
 is to the material ; and were that great law suspend- 
 ed which preserves the planets in their orbits, it 
 were not more absurd to propose to remedy the con- 
 sequent disorder without restoring its dominion, than 
 to talk of re-establishing true happiness on earth 
 without restoring the love which alone can produce 
 it. Now, is it not surprising that in days when such 
 
THE MEDICINE THE GRAND SPECIFIC. 267 
 
 homage is done to physical science there should be 
 such forgetfulness of moral science : that men who 
 can eloquently describe how the mote in the sun- 
 beam is governed in its wanderings by unchanging 
 laws, seem as if they thought the immortal spirit 
 subject to no laws whatever ; and that while in obe- 
 dience to the former men plough the ocean, rear the 
 engine, and make the elements their ministering ser- 
 vants, they act as though the latter could be disre- 
 garded with perfect impunity ! Propose to endow the 
 Ptolemaic system of astronomy, because 80,000,000 
 of our heathen fellow-subjects believe it; and the idea 
 would be pronounced insane, and the man who would 
 entertain it fit only for a bedlam, for thus attempt- 
 ing to turn back the world on its onward march. 
 But a Ptolemaic system of religion prevails amongst 
 us, yet it is smiled on and pensioned ; its disasters 
 begin to be felt, and, by way of cure, the smiles are 
 multiplied and the pension is increased ; tens of thou- 
 sands are voted to a college to teach it, and then 
 hundreds of thousands for a force to keep down the 
 evils it creates ; and thus the ruin goes on, till the 
 country's dissolution draws nigh, and statesmen are 
 at their wit's end ; and all because, despite every 
 warning, they will continue to set at defiance eternal 
 laws, as fixed and immutable as those which guide 
 the stars in their courses. Nay, some of them will 
 tell you that a country's religion is its merest acci- 
 dent, and not worth a statesman's thoughts, unless 
 when it becomes necessary to humor the people's 
 
268 THE CURE. 
 
 prejudices ! And hence the ignorant cant to which 
 we are so often doomed to listen, which pronounces 
 it true liberality to regard all religions alike, and 
 weak-minded bigotry to recommend heaven's own 
 statute-book as Ireland's remedy ! Bigotry, for- 
 sooth ! to say that those laws by which the universe 
 is governed should form the basis of earthly legisla- 
 tion ! And enlightenment, forsooth ! to scout those 
 eternal principles with which even the supreme Gov- 
 ernor could not dispense without turning his fair 
 dominions into chaos ! 
 
 The Fruits. — Such is the philosophy of the glori- 
 ous gospel, and we can now only take a mere glimpse 
 of its fruits. And, for the sake of more perfect 
 conclusiveness, we shall follow the order observed 
 while tracing the baleful influence of Popery, — and 
 show the benign effects of the gospel in awakening 
 the mind, purifying the conscience, warming the 
 heart, elevating the ivhole nature, and so blessing 
 for time, and fitting for eternity. 
 
 1. The gospel awakens t/ie mind. — If superstition, 
 its w^healthy state, paralyzes it, true religion, its 
 healthy state, must proportionally invigorate it. 
 Besides, the Christian 1 * mind is constantly exer- 
 cised on themes inconceivably grand, and above all 
 others calculated to promote its growth and vitality. 
 Hence his usually intelligent countenance, so re- 
 markably contrasting with the superstitious devo- 
 tee's contracted brow. Who can daily study a 
 
THE MEDICINE THE GRAND SPECIFIC. 269 
 
 book which contains all that most concerns the 
 Creator and creation, and is the very synopsis of 
 the laws and principles of the universe, without 
 finding in it the most nourishing food and powerful 
 stimulus to the mind 1 Talk of your philosophy in 
 comparison ! Your men of science dabble in the 
 streamlets of knowledge, — this leads you to the 
 great Fountainhead. Now, only contrast the mere 
 effect on the immortal mind during a long lifetime 
 of such ambrosial food, with that of the senseless 
 trash of Popish legends ; and if even the insect 
 takes the hue of the leaf it feeds on, what must be 
 the influence of such mental diet on the Protestant 
 and the Papist respectively 1 Just what you see in 
 Ireland. If the mind of the Clare peasant had 
 been nourished on the Bible, would he have fled in 
 terror at the priest's threat to turn him " into a 
 goose or a turkey-cock ?" and were it universally 
 read amongst us, where would be our holy wells, 
 and the thousand other schemes of priestcraft to 
 filch the cash from the pocket of credulity? The 
 effect would be just the reverse of what we have 
 found that of Popery to be. The Papist's mind 
 mesmerized, and the Protestant's stimulated at the 
 altar on the Sabbath, each feels the effect through- 
 out the week. The one paralyzed and the other 
 quickened, in reference to their eternal concerns, you 
 see the respective influences on all their temporal. 
 In the one case, the whole process cramps and 
 deadens ; in the other, it quickens and expands. 
 
270 THE CURE. 
 
 And this at once explains how art, and science, and 
 every improvement are as common in gospel lands 
 as they are rare in Popish. Nor mnst we forget the 
 enormous contributions which the Bible has directly 
 given to learning and philosophy. For how many 
 of the worshippers of science have adorned their 
 idol with laurels stolen from it ; how many of our 
 poets have gathered their richest gems in its mines ; 
 how many of our infidels have taken their only good • 
 thoughts from its pages ; and thus resembled the 
 pirate who would rob the ship of her treasures, and 
 then try to scuttle and sink her ! And hence it was 
 that the immortal Newton could step from the study 
 of the stars to that of his Bible, and feel no change 
 except from high to higher pursuits. 
 
 2. The gospel purifies the conscience. — Yes ; and 
 it alone can do so. If vice could have ever been 
 charmed out of its propensities by the magic spell 
 of eloquence, or crime arrested by the lightning of 
 genius, or the sinner induced by witching persuasion 
 to go and sin no more, it would surely have been by 
 the enchanting powers of the illustrious Chalmers. 
 Yet, as we have found, even he could not moralize 
 until he had first evangelized. And is there any 
 miracle in this 1 How can that man wrong his 
 neighbor who ever sees the eye of God above him, 
 and a yawning hell beneath him ; who knows that 
 every sin deserves eternal wrath, and is impelled to 
 every duty by all the sanctions which can be drawn 
 from time and eternity ? Is it not perfectly obvious, 
 
THE MEDICINE THE GRAND SPECIFIC 271 
 
 that beneath the sway of such a religion no treachery 
 could wear the mask of friendship, nor heartless stoi- 
 cism personate humanity, nor midnight assassin lurk 
 behind the hedge, nor villain escape under forms of 
 law ? Is it not manifest, that beneath its breath 
 party influence must expire, that before its glance 
 corruption must flee appalled, that at its voice neg- 
 lected worth would emerge from the shade, and 
 merit become the only road to honor, and that un- 
 der its sway " nothing would be found to hurt or de- 
 stroy ?" Oh ! did such a religion only sit by the 
 monarch on his throne, and the merchant at his desk, 
 and become the presiding genius of every family, the 
 companion of every closet, and the inmate of every 
 heart, how soon would the earth look out from her 
 mantle of woe, with her pristine smile of paradisaic 
 joy ! In view of a system so divine, the prophet's 
 most glowing pictures of the millennium are stripped 
 of their poetry and transformed into sober prose. 
 If it only prevailed in Ireland, where would be her 
 crime and criminals ? Yet men, who have tried all 
 other remedies upon her, and only to have their fail- 
 ure recorded in the already copious records of their 
 blundering and shame, will scarce listen gravely 
 when we suggest this divine specific for her maladies, 
 but will pension and smile on that antagonist sys- 
 tem which has ruined her ! 
 
 3. The gospel gives a, Jieart ; and here is its chief 
 glory. Before its benign smiles, chains and fetters, 
 racks and thumbscrews vanish. It has penetrated 
 
272 THE CURE. 
 
 the criminal's cell, relaxed bis chains and washed his 
 stripes ; it has reared its asylums, and filled them 
 with the poor and the maimed, the halt and the 
 blind ; it has rolled the tides of eloquence on behalf 
 of distress, until the heart of stoicism has melted, 
 the hand of avarice has relaxed, luxury has dealt its 
 bread to the hungry, and vanity cast its jewels to the 
 poor. See that good Samaritan pouring oil into the 
 stranger's wounds, that amiable Dorcas clothing 
 some beggar-boy, that angel of mercy in human form 
 standing by the dying bed ! See that retreat for the 
 destitute, that infirmary for the dying, that refuge for 
 the fallen, that hospital for orphan childhood, that 
 almshouse for infirm old age, and far above all, that 
 divine array of institutions for causing the waters of 
 life to circulate over the world ! Say ye these are 
 the fruits of civilization ? Deny ye the glory to the 
 despised Nazarene? Then look to your favorite 
 Greece and Rome ! Do our bards surpass their poets, 
 our builders their architects, our sculptors their 
 Phidiases, our orators their Ciceros ? They have 
 left behind them monuments of pride and cruelty in 
 abundance ; where are their monuments of mercy 
 and love? Pass through Imperial Rome at the 
 zenith of her power ; or survey at this instant her 
 ruins of proud magnificence, glowing in the splen- 
 dors of an Italian sunset. You gaze on that amphi- 
 theatre of monumental wonders — the Capitol — the 
 Pantheon — the Portico — the Forum — the Arch of 
 Titus — the Coliseum, where men were butchered for 
 
THE MEDICINE THE GRAND SPECIFIC. 273 
 
 amusement. And is there amongst them all not 
 one monument ; ; f mercy? — no hospital for the sick 
 — no asylum for the helpless — no school for the poor? 
 No, not one ! And it would be difficult to find in 
 their purest classic writers a word answering to our 
 idea of infirmary ; they never possessed the institu- 
 tion, and did not want the name ! 
 
 4. The gospel elevates the ichule nature. — Indeed, 
 Christianity cannot but make great and noble char- 
 acters. Infusing the loftiest principles of virtue, and 
 enforcing these by motives drawn from the skies, it 
 inspires the Christian with that heroism which others 
 too often simulate, and gives the substance while 
 they have but the shadow. With him, Divine prin- 
 ciple takes the place of the ■ hectic stimulants of 
 earthly honor and applause. Being " G-od's off- 
 spring," he is of course " a partaker of the Divine 
 nature," and as such is incapable of grovelling mean- 
 ness. The man who communes with the skies, can 
 lie lick the dust in crouching servility % — or the man 
 who fears his God, is he likely to tremble before a 
 worm of the dust ? No : such a religion must im- 
 part the loftiest dignity to the whole character. 
 Hence it has numbered thousands of men, and toomen 
 too, in the ranks of dauntless martyrdom ; and given 
 birth to a heroism far more sublime than was ever 
 felt by mere worldly bravery ;— instance Paul before 
 Agrippa, or the wife of Welsh before James ! And 
 thus is at once explained the fact, that Protestant 
 nations are as great and free as Popish ones are 
 
 18 
 
274 THE CURE. 
 
 mean and degraded. The one is subjected to a pro- 
 cess which indefinitely elevates, and the other to a 
 process which as indefinitely degrades ; and hence 
 the prodigious superiority in the tone of the former. 
 There, woman is found in her true place, by the side 
 of man ; there, man indignantly spurns every chain 
 which cruelty would forge, or cupidity fasten ; and 
 there alone is realized that liberty which Paganism 
 knows only in its poetry, and Popery only in its 
 dreams. In truth, without the gospel real elevation 
 is impossible. Would you ever think of looking to 
 other than to Bible lands for all that gives true 
 moral dignity to man I No ; while beneath its di- 
 vine sway serfdom and barbarism are simple impos- 
 sibilities, without it you have virtual degradation even 
 amid the splendor of arts, like ancient Greece, and 
 arms like ancient Rome, and both like imperial France. 
 5. The gospel blesses man for time : — and how 
 simple the means by which it does so ; and how well 
 worth your study, ye statesmen and philosophers ! 
 It approaches the thief and the robber, and how does 
 it act ? Does it philosop)liize on the rights of prop- 
 erty, &c, and by these conjure him to reform? If 
 it did, then we own ye might indeed sneer. No ; 
 taking far loftier ground, it pours out the denuncia- 
 tions of the Almighty, and pictures the horrors of 
 the damned, until he turns pale and stands aghast : 
 and then telling him of a Saviour who has purchased 
 mercy even for him, and assuring him of pardon if he 
 will repent and believe on Him, and Divine aid to 
 
THE MEDICINE THE GRAND SPECIFIC. 275 
 
 enable him to do so if he will sincerely seek it, it 
 conjures him to turn to God, and walk in his ways ; 
 and in thousands of cases succeeds. Now, must 
 not such a religion perfectly annihilate the worst 
 causes of social misery? How can that people be 
 restless, who are thus taught " to be content ;" or 
 disloyal, who "fear God and honor the king;" or 
 dishonest, who "render unto all their due;" or idle, 
 who dread the sin of being t: slothful in business ;" 
 or turbulent, who " follow peace with all men V' 
 What child does not see that a parish of real Chris- 
 tians must be one of loyal subjects, industrious 
 people, united families, honest masters, and faithful 
 servants ? Here is the whole secret. You begin at 
 the wrong end when you address yourselves first to 
 men's temporal interests : — we teach them to " seek 
 first the kingdom of God and his righteousness," 
 and this necessarily involving every subordinate ob- 
 ject, " all other things are" of consequence " added." 
 Securing their duty to God, we secure, of course 
 their duty to mem ; and by this simple means of 
 prevailing on them to seek their eternal salvation, 
 we bind them d fortiori to observe all those virtues 
 which enhance their temporal state. 
 
 Here, then, ye statesmen, is the source of true na- 
 tional greatness. If yon would bring back the 
 golden age, it is not by turning everything into gold, 
 but by the nobler alchemy of the heart. If you 
 would improve a people's social condition, improve 
 their religious tone ; and the eifect of this will go 
 
276 THE CURE. 
 
 out in directions of which you never thought. As 
 the morning sun enables the shepherd to guide his 
 flocks to pasture, but is by the same beams waking 
 a thousand forms of life around him, so would the 
 Sun of Righteousness enable you to guide this great 
 nation, and at the same time shed on it a thousand 
 blessings of which you never dreamed. Here too, 
 ye patriots, is the true parent of liberty. The Sa- 
 viour was one of the people : and it were impossible 
 to half obey his precepts without banishing all des- 
 potism from the earth. Here is the true friend of 
 equal rights, ; forbidding alike the tyranny of the 
 sovereign and the treason of the subject. Here is 
 the inspirer of that genuine patriotism to which so 
 many only pretend, -and the parent of that peace of 
 which your " peace societies" idly dream. Attempt- 
 ing to take out of the hands of the Prince of peace 
 his own proper work, these Utopian visionaries lately 
 assembled in the Crystal Palace as their temple of 
 concord ; bat their schemes of peace proved as 
 fragile as the building they met in. There "all na- 
 tions" shook hands, it is true ; but thence they de- 
 parted, and rumors of wars immediately sprung up ! 
 Alas ! they knew not the true talisman of peace, 
 which alone can make men ' : beat their swords into 
 ploughshares, and their spears into pruning-hooks." 
 Here too is the grand source of individual wealth. 
 True, many believers have little ; they would have 
 less but for believing. For no man can be a Chris- 
 tian without possessing those qualities, and earning 
 
THE MEDICINE THE GRAND SPECIFIC. 277 
 
 that character, which tend to advancement. And to 
 see this, you need only contrast the career of the 
 followers of Paine, or Pio Nono, with that of the 
 disciples of Jesus. And while the gospel thus leads 
 to wealth, it not less wonderfully sustains in poverty. 
 It is emphatically tlie 'poor man's religion ; — and, 
 oh ! what a counterpoise he feels in its promises to 
 all the ills that flesh is heir to ! Taught to walk by 
 faith in his heavenly father, he can maintain a placid 
 brow amid the gathering storms of life ; for he sees 
 his Parent's love in the dark skies of adversity, as 
 well as in the bright beams of prosperity, and hears 
 it in the loud bowlings of life's storms, alike with 
 the gentle breathing of its zephyrs. Oh, the treble 
 wrong of Popery ! first to reduce our countrymen to 
 misery ; next to rob them of a religion so consoling ; 
 and then to inflict instead a superstition so baleful ! 
 Yet Newman says that religion has nothing to do 
 with a nation's greatness ! ! Another proof that his 
 religion, according to his own confession, lacks that 
 "righteousness" which does and must "exalt it." 
 The Sun of Righteousness cannot but bless for both 
 worlds ; — for as the light of the natural sun, his 
 type, not only reveals the azure depths from which 
 it came, but spreads a mantle of beauty over the 
 earth it falls on ; so does He not only reveal our re- 
 lations to God, but spreads over all the mutual rela- 
 tions of man that moral verdure, without which so- 
 ciety would be a waste.* 
 
 * Williams. 
 
278 THE CURE. 
 
 6. But tlie gospel mainly respects a better world. — 
 True, it is like the majestic river, which, while urg- 
 ing its course to the main, clothes with verdure the 
 countries it flows through ; — but this is only its 
 secondary object. True, this angel sent to bring 
 God's people home, smooths and cheers the path 
 they travel on ; but its grand com mission respects 
 the performance, not the comfort of the journey. 
 And it were an insult, not an honor, to view it as a 
 mere system of police, and forget its glory as a 
 scheme of salvation ; and as absurd too as to sup- 
 pose that Christ its author, because he restored the 
 sick, came to heal men's bodies, and not to save their 
 souls. Its grand concern is with eternity. And as 
 our whole line of argument has already demonstra- 
 ted that it, and it alone, can fit for heaven, addition- 
 al proof is perfectly useless. Since then it is need- 
 less to address the judgment further on the subject, 
 we eagerly seize the opportunity thus afforded of 
 making our solemn appeal to the heart. Then, dear 
 reader, whoever you are, bear with one remark. 
 The subject of this work is almost too general to 
 impress the individual conscience. Speaking of an 
 entire nation, one is apt to get lost in the crowd ; 
 but our national connection, how brief it is ! Soon 
 must we retire from the scene, and leave our coun- 
 try in other hands ; then how prodigious our folly, 
 if, while concerned about its salvation, we should be 
 found to have neglected our own ! How is it with 
 you ? If heaven at all differs from earth, you would 
 
THE MEDICINE THE GRAND SPECIFIC- 279 
 
 gain nothing by being removed thither without un- 
 dergoing such a change as would fit you for that dif- 
 ference. Hence as it is a place of holiness, " yon 
 must be horn again," and undergo the meetening 
 process of progressive sanctijkation. Is your grace 
 then ripening iuto glory, your path shining more 
 and more? It is thus you may read your destiny 
 in your character and life; and this is the only in- 
 fallible test. Then, by the worth of your souls we 
 implore you to apply it. Indifference here is the 
 worst kind of insanity. Indifference ! — in a case in 
 which enthusiasm is sobriety, and exaggeration is 
 impossible ! — the wildest fanaticism were rational in 
 comparison, and the gloomiest skepticism not half so 
 perilous. 
 
 Such is a mere outline of the fruits of the gospel 
 of Christ ! No wonder, indeed, that angels sung his 
 first advent, and the earth herself will become vocal 
 at his second. Yet " these are but a part of his 
 ways ;" and in drawing this brief sketch, we have felt 
 like one who surveys the placid ocean from the 
 masthead, and can but descry a few miles around, 
 while a boundless expanse of waters stretches away 
 undiscovered beyond. Yet this is the system of 
 which some exclaim, " What has religion to do with 
 national greatness?" and men who will sit at the 
 feet of Smith or Blackstone, to learn the secret of a 
 nation's government, will scorn to sit at the feet of 
 Jesus ! If his minister presents his great statute- 
 book at the senate house, he is told that its sphere 
 
280 THE CURE. 
 
 is the nursery or the sick chamber. If he brings it 
 to the college, he is derisively asked, What has reli- 
 gion to do with learning? And if he would intro- 
 duce it to the school-house, he is informed that it is 
 too holy a book to put into the hands of children ! 
 Are the men fit to rule this great empire who do not 
 yet know what has made it great ; or to govern 
 Ireland, who will not learn the lesson its northern 
 province would teach them ? Ye godless statesmen, 
 go to Ulster, the only part of Ireland which saves 
 your credit ; and say, is it the ministers of the 
 Crown, or those of the Cross, who deserve this 
 credit ? While the turbulent priest has been sowing 
 the fair south thick with disorder, visit that northern 
 congregation. Mark their intelligence, their decorum, 
 their quietness so profound, that the thought of dis- 
 turbance has never crossed them in their dreams. 
 Where are your police, your soldiers, your magis- 
 trates ? They are not there ; for they are not 
 wanted. Then, who has done all this 1 A single 
 gospel minister. That man's voice it is which has 
 hushed that parish to stillness. That man's hand it 
 is which has sown it so thick with industry, that no 
 beggar is seen there ; with light, that superstition is 
 unknown there ; and with peace, that were an agita- 
 tor to come there, the only breach of the peace at all 
 likely to ensue would be one committed on himself; 
 and his secret is — the glorious gospel. Or, if 
 you are yet so obtuse as not to learn this lesson from 
 Ulster, then cross the channel, and say, what has 
 
THE MEDICINE THE GllAND SPECIFIC. 281 
 
 subdued the rugged Scot, once as wild as his moun- 
 tains, and spread peace and gladness over all his 
 borders? What else but the everlasting gospel? 
 And if you will not receive this at our humble lips, 
 surely you will hearken to Scotland's own deathless 
 orator — Chalmers — when he tells you that, but for 
 this, " the ferocity of their ancestors would have 
 come down, un softened and unsubdued, to the exist- 
 ing generation. The darkening spirit of hostility 
 would still have lowered upon us from the north ; 
 and these plains, now so peaceful and so happy, 
 would have lain open to the fury of merciless inva- 
 ders. Oh, ye soft and sentimental travellers, who 
 wander so securely over this romantic land, you are 
 right to choose the season when the angry elements 
 of nature are asleep ! But what is it that has 
 charmed to their long repose the more dreadful 
 elements of human passion and human injustice? 
 What is it that has quelled the boisterous spirit of 
 her natives ? — and while her torrents roar as fiercely, 
 and her mountain brows look as grim as ever, what 
 is that which has thrown so softening an influence 
 over the minds and manners of her living population?" 
 " What would they have been at this moment, had 
 schools, and Bibles, and ministers been kept back 
 from them?" 
 
282 THE CURE. 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 TREATMENT INFORMATION. 
 
 We have thus got distinctly before us the curse 
 and the cure — the poison and the medicine. And 
 the question remains, What are the best means of 
 removing the one and dispensing the other? Our 
 first obvious duty is to inform the public as to what 
 is the curse and the cure. Rome has long flourished 
 on Protestant ignorance. In these happy realms, 
 we see but the skirts of her foul garments ; hence 
 that good old horror of Popery which our godly 
 fathers felt, has grown unpopular; and there has 
 sprung up a class of Protestants who, while revel- 
 ling in the blessings those fathers wrung from her 
 with their blood, denounce them as narrow-minded 
 bigots ; — men whose own creed is their condemna- 
 tion — who betray the principles they profess to up- 
 hold — who are the inquiring Romanist's worst stum- 
 bling-block, and furnish Rome with her best argu- 
 ment — who even presume to read us lectures on 
 Christian charity — and whom we are chiefly to 
 thank for the vast growth of Popish power amongst 
 us, and that suicidal pro-Popery legislation, under 
 which the kingdom begins to reel. Some good men, 
 too, have followed their example; and forgetting 
 that Rome is a " beast," they have thought, in their 
 ignorance, to coax and conciliate her, and discounte- 
 
TREATMENT INFORMATION. 283 
 
 nance, as improper, those terms which God himself 
 applies to her. " The Man of Sin" is, in their par- 
 lance, the sovereign pontiff", and the "Mystery of 
 Iniquity," the Catholic Church ; " Popery," is Cathol- 
 icism, and the " priests," the Catholic clergy ! By 
 this course, they have thought to conciliate Rome, 
 as if Satan could be vanquished by smiles and com- 
 pliments ! and to convert her people, as if the best 
 way to alarm their souls was to half conceal their 
 danger ! Alas, such are neither the men nor the 
 means God usually honors! We stop not to ask 
 on what grounds our country's great Destroyer is 
 entitled to such courtesy ; we would only say, that 
 those who would encounter the Popish "Antichrist," 
 can still less afford to "wear soft raiment" than 
 either Elijah or the Baptist. We ourselves once 
 thought that blandness was better than boldness ; 
 but experience has taught us God's infinite wisdom 
 in giving so much sternness to his best reformers, 
 and amply explained why Luther and Knox were so 
 much more successful than Cranmer and Melancthon. 
 Now, we must get done with this misplaced suavity, 
 and in order thereto, strip off the drapery in which 
 Protestant pseudo-liberalism has decked out Rome, 
 and uncover her nakedness to universal gaze. We 
 must take means that the whole nation shall make 
 their perfect acquaintance with her ; and then they 
 will instantly see that the robber is entitled to as 
 much courtesy as Rome, and that gentleness to her 
 is cruelty to her victims. 
 
284 THE CURE. 
 
 This information should be practical and scientific 
 as well as theological. Perhaps we have made the 
 whole question of Popery too much an ecclesiastical 
 one ; and this may be the reason why many feel no 
 interest in it, and deem it, for the most part, a sec- 
 tarian squabble of little social importance. Now, 
 we must deal more with the practical of Rome ; 
 show that it concerns the politician as well as the 
 theologian ; the citizen of this world as well as the 
 expectant of the next ; and convict it as man's great 
 foe, not merely from revelation, but from science and 
 fact. It has a prodigious advantage of us while we 
 treat it on merely religious grounds ; for that is a 
 province so repulsive to some, and so mysterious to 
 others, that they will not follow us into it. We 
 must, then, for their sakcs. come down from the 
 mount ; and, as the great apostle met the philoso- 
 phic Greek on Mars Hill, as well as the superstitious 
 Jew in the temple, and with arguments admirably 
 adapted to each, so must we show practical men the 
 facts, and scientific men the philosophy, as well as 
 religious men the theology, of this question. Had 
 Popery thus long ago been treated ; had its falseness 
 been demonstrated by an appeal to fact and philoso- 
 phy, as well as to Scripture ; had it been shown to 
 be a violation of the great laws of the universe, as 
 much as the incantations of witchcraft, what could 
 have hindered it from sharing the same fate? At 
 least surely we would not now hear the cry of prac- 
 tical infidelity, What has religion to do with science 1 
 
TREATMENT INFORMATION. 285 
 
 — nor that of sickly pietism, What has science to do 
 with religion ? — nor would we have appeals against 
 Popery characterized as the effusions of bigotry ; 
 nor a college endowed for teaching transubstantia- 
 tion, any more than schools for propagating the 
 Hindoo notion that the earth rests on an elephant's 
 back, or the Peruvian belief that eclipses are at- 
 tempts of a dragon to devour the sun. 
 
 Moreover, Popery is not enough felt to be Satan's 
 
 GRAND CONTRIVANCE TO COUNTERWORK THE GOSPEL. 
 
 We have not been at sufficient pains to trace the ca- 
 reer of this great agent of evil, and show that as he 
 had ruder snares for earlier ages, he has more elab- 
 orate devices for modern ones; — that as all truth 
 is one, so in reality is all error ; and that as Grod 
 has gradually developed the truth to suit the gradu- 
 al developments of our race, from the patriarchal to 
 the Christian age, so has Satan as gradually devel 
 oped the error, from the rudest forms of early idol 
 atry to Popery his masterpiece ; — that as in the va 
 rious systems of light, you have the same great fea- 
 tures of salvation by grace through a divine Saviour, 
 and by a divine Spirit, reproduced with increasing 
 clearness till we reach Christianity, the mystery of 
 godliness, so in the various systems of darkness we 
 have the same counterfeit features of salvation by 
 works through priests and mummeries, till we reach 
 Popery, the mystery of iniquity ; — and that as the 
 gospel is the last and most perfect development of 
 the one, so is Toper y of the other. Yet it is thus 
 
286 THE CURE. 
 
 we ought to handle Popery, and prove that it is the 
 elaborate result of ages of Satan's experience in the 
 art of ruining souls ; and that in order to its con- 
 summate perfection, that evil one has laid all his 
 other systems under contribution, and not only 
 rifled Judaism, but culled from Gnosticism and pla- 
 giarized Paganism. Here, for instance, you have 
 Pharisaism contributing its outward purifications and 
 " traditions of the elders." Here you have celibacy, 
 self-inflictions, and monastic austerities, borrowed 
 from the Gnostic, who thought matter the source of 
 evil, and the flesh the seat of sin. And here, above 
 all, you have Paganism baptized in the name of 
 Jesus ; with Peter for Jupiter — Mary, the Papist's 
 queen of heaven, for Juno, the Pagan's — and saints 
 and angels for gods and demi-gods. Ay, and so 
 shameless has been the plagiarism, that purgatory is 
 accurately described in Virgil's iEneid ; the pres- 
 ent statue of Peter at Rome is the identical statue 
 of Jupiter Capitolinus ; even the Pope's chair is 
 said to have been pilfered from the Mussulman ; and 
 Romulus and Remus are worshipped as two holy 
 bishops,^under the names of Romulo and Remigio !•* 
 Such is the ground we should take — exposing the 
 Satanic philosojjhy of Popery, and showing that it 
 is an eclectic system of evil, contrived with fearful 
 skill to thwart every law of God and of our nature, 
 and to poison the springs of salvation ; and all un- 
 der the most ingenious guise of Christianity. In a 
 * Seymour's Pilgrimage to Rome. 
 
TREATMENT INFORMATION. 287 
 
 word, it should be our labor to show that Popery 
 was born at the fall, and came of age when the triple 
 crown was mounted ; and that as light was God's 
 first creation, but was diffused through the firma- 
 ment till centered in the sun on the fourth day, so 
 in reality Popery was Satan's first offspring, whose 
 diffused spirit you can distinctly trace through all 
 false systems, but which only attained a fixed and 
 visible centre when enthroned on the seven hills. 
 
 It is also of immense importance that Home's 
 tactics in these L ingdoms should be thoroughly un- 
 derstood. They are embraced in two words, cun- 
 ning and blustering — admirably adapted to the in- 
 firmities of the English character. The English- 
 man, honest himself, is disposed to think all others 
 so, and to forget that it is the greatest deceivers who 
 smile most sweetly, aud the greatest cowards who 
 bluster most vociferously : and so he who rules the 
 main, and gives laws to the nations, has been alter- 
 nately cajoled and frightened by a few priests. And 
 to what terrible account they have turned this great 
 error ! Just as England has yielded, they have en- 
 croached ; and she has never stood firm but they 
 have at once knocked under. The more sops she 
 Las thrown to these Irish Cerberuses they have only 
 growled the louder, and she has never chastised them 
 but they have cowered into their dens. In 1641, 
 the tampering of Charles brought on a rebellion ; 
 Cromwell came, and in six months made the country 
 that honest men could live in it for half-a-century 
 
288 THE CURE. 
 
 after. In the latter end of last century, the volcano 
 began once more to smoke and rumble. Pitt, to 
 quiet it, founded a college, and promised emancipa- 
 tion. The rebellion of 1798 was the gratitude he 
 received ; and coercion again quelled the storm which 
 false conciliation had occasioned. A brief interval 
 only elapsed, when the priests returned to their old 
 trade of hatching rebellion ; concession was again 
 tried ; and when, in 1829, emancipation was granted, 
 the}- pledged themselves that they would henceforth 
 be quiet. Did they keep their pledge a day ? No ; 
 agitation only increased ; and our rulers, to quiet it, 
 increased the Maynooth grant, jjroposed to endow 
 the priest, ay, and approached the den of the beast to 
 beg he would keep " his Irish cubs," as they have 
 been termed, in order ; — so that even a Con naught 
 peasant was heard to exclaim. - They would pension 
 the devil, sir, if he would promise to keep the priests 
 quiet." Well, this petting ended as before, in an- 
 other rebellion : troops once more came, and peace 
 was restored. Last of all, Wiseman arrived — Eng- 
 land arose — and the Pope trembled; but her splendid 
 Protestant demonstrations ended in a ridiculous Ag- 
 gression Bill; and instantly the " Catholic Defence 
 Association" was formed, which proposes to change 
 even the " Protestant succession." Now, we must 
 get done with this absurd and ruinous policy, and 
 restore the true difference between the righteous and 
 the wicked. What claim have these men to this ex- 
 cessive dandling % Is it their usefulness ? Yes ; 
 
TREATMENT: — INFORMATION. 289 
 
 and Ireland is its monument ! whose every town is 
 polluted by their intrigues, and pestered by their 
 outrages. Is it their loyalty ? Yes ; and our rebel- 
 lions are the proofs ! And shall we continue ex- 
 tending them privileges which we see uniformly 
 turned against the givers, and only employed to 
 effect our own overthrow ? Is not hatred of England 
 the feeling they are constantly instilling into their 
 credulous people's minds 1 — and with such fearful 
 success, that thousands of emigrants are yearly leav- 
 ing us with scalding curses on their lips against her, 
 and even from their new transatlantic home the 
 western breeze wafts many a deep malediction ; inso- 
 much that were another American war to break out, 
 England's deadliest foes would be those of her own 
 household, and their very children would rush as to 
 a sacred duty to revenge their fathers' "wrongs." 
 Indeed, Irish priests take no pains to disguise their 
 malignant hate, or conceal their joy at England's 
 most trifling embarrassments ; — who can forget their 
 delight, for example, when the first reverses of the 
 Punjaub were announced '? Yes ; and this hatred 
 no kindness has been able to mitigate. If ever one 
 transient glow of gratitude could have been kindled 
 in their breasts, it would have surely been by Eng- 
 land's kindness during the famine ; when, from the 
 Queen to the cottager, from the church to the thea- 
 tre, all ranks and classes poured in their munificent 
 offerings. Well, scarce had that famine abated, when 
 the convulsions of Europe occurred ; the priests could 
 
 19 
 
290 THE CURE. 
 
 not conceal their ecstasy at the prospect of Eng- 
 land's being involved in a continental war ; and in 
 hope of this they fomented the rebellion of 1 848 ! 
 Tims, while Britain's meat was in their mouths did 
 they attempt to stab to the heart the benefactress 
 which had saved them alive, and give too just ground 
 for the remark, " That Rome was like the hyena, 
 which hunger could not tame, nor kindness con- 
 ciliate !" 
 
 Finally, it needs to be proclaimed with trumpet- 
 tongue that the priests have for years been playing a 
 deep game for the reconquest of " perfidious Albion ;" 
 for there are thousands of our people whose eyes 
 no amount of evidence on this point has yet been 
 able to open. Forgetting that Rome is " all a lie," 
 and therefore more dangerous in her smiles than her 
 fury — forgetting that unerring Scripture has assigned 
 her the twofold character of beast and serpent, and 
 that when she dare not be the one, she is sure to be 
 the other — forgetting that while in Naples she is 
 strewing her noisome lair with dead and dying cap- 
 tives, in England the language of meekness drops 
 from her lips soft as the dews of Hermon, — forget- 
 ting all this, multitudes still listen unsuspecting to 
 her brazen protestations of innocence and truth. 
 And skilfully has she traded on this incomprehensi- 
 ble stupidity ! If we say she is mild because she 
 dare not be fierce^ in tones of injured innocence she 
 complains of our bigotry ; and adjusting the mask 
 of virgin loveliness over her haggard face, and the 
 
TREATMENT INFORMATION. 29 1 
 
 robe of angel purity over her hideous form, she 
 walks through Westminster, looking up to heaven 
 with eyes of meek resignation ! And many believe 
 her ! Scarlet, they say, may once have been her 
 dress, but now it is virgin white ! Infatuated men ! 
 Will no amount of treachery open your eyes ? — and 
 will you really adduce in proof of her dove-like in- 
 nocence, that simulated smile which most clearly 
 proves her the child of him whose 
 
 " Gentle dumb expression, turned at length 
 
 The eye of Eve— " 1 
 
 Will you not at least believe Iwrself- — for she makes 
 no secret that England is the dazzling prize she 
 struggles for 1 Were you not told by Father Igna- 
 tius, of " praying societies" for her conversion, and 
 of the 300 days' indulgence lately granted to all 
 who would say a " Hail, Mary," for this object ? 
 Were you not told by Gavazzi of " Jesuit servant 
 societies," for enabling these pests of mankind to 
 creep into Protestant families in the guise of do- 
 mestics 1 Is not the bull " In cozno Domini" read 
 from every chapel each holy Thursday, thus proving 
 to all who are not willing dupes, that Rome has 
 never abandoned her demands on England's fealty? 
 And if she claims to ride over us now when she 
 cannot, will she not do so the first moment she 
 can ? And think you the man who for this object 
 keeps his fanatics praying, and his Jesuits prowling 
 over the land : would not hurl our Queen from her 
 
292 THE CURE. 
 
 throne if he could, and put a Mary or a James in 
 her room 1 Then let all Englishmen know assured- 
 ly, that Rome's deadly eye is on '• their faith and 
 their firesides ;" and that wherever they meet her 
 clouds of priests, whether heading a mob, horsewhip 
 in hand, or at vice-regal levees in silken hose ; 
 whether putting down a school in Connaught, or 
 getting wp one in Edinburgh; all — all are patient- 
 ly performing their several parts in this gigantic 
 conspiracy against Protestant England. The ser- 
 pent's great design is on that Eden of Protestantism, 
 and he has for years been stealing steadily towards 
 it ; and whether he has been now taking a circuitous 
 route to beguile the simple, or again hiding amongst 
 the flowers to elude the' suspicious, or, as in tlie late 
 aggression, making a visible spring — be assured of 
 this one thing, that on he comes. And even grant- 
 ing that Home has for once made a blunder, and 
 having missed her spring, may now slink into the 
 thicket and wait a better opportunity — even grant- 
 ing that she has found the breach not yet practi- 
 cable, and may suspend the assault, in order the 
 more noiselessly to expedite the mine — what doom 
 do we deserve if we ever forget the lesson she has 
 taught us ? She will profit by her blunder — and if 
 we do not, the stolid infatuation of Samson, while 
 fondling with another harlot, was sagacious vigi- 
 lance in comparison ; and, resembling him in his 
 folly we will assuredly be like him in his fate ! 
 
TREATMENT LEGISLATION. 293 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 TREATMENT LEGISLATION. 
 
 Some have a prejudice against legislative inter 
 ference with Rome, as though it were an encroach- 
 ment of the temporal power on the spiritual. They 
 forget that Rome is a power, both temporal and spir- 
 itual — that the Pope is G-od's viceroy as well as his 
 vicar, and wears a crown as well as a cross ; that 
 " all power is Christ's in heaven and on earth," and 
 must therefore be his, as Christ's representative ; 
 and that those principles which they guard with such 
 praiseworthy jealousy are therefore inapplicable to 
 Rome. Of course, she denies this also ; and in 
 Britain, notwithstanding Wiseman's office and acts, 
 claims to be merely spiritual. But has she not ever 
 proved the most intolerable temporal tyrant that 
 ever trampled down the nations? Is not the Pope 
 "dominus totius orbis" — and not content to be a 
 king among kings, has he not ever claimed to be 
 king of kings 1 How many monarchs has he de- 
 throned, and kingdoms absolved from their oaths of 
 allegiance ? How often has he made, sovereigns hold 
 his stirrup, and their prostrate necks the steps from 
 which he mounted it 1 And if such things occur not 
 now, think you is want of power or of ivill the rea- 
 son ? Yet, in the face of her history, her decrees, 
 and all her acts this moment, many have somehow 
 
294 THE CURE. 
 
 been cajoled into the notion, that we ought to deal 
 with Rome as a mere spiritual power. So boots 
 and thumbscrews are spiritual weapons ! — stakes and 
 fagots spiritual arguments ! — and the annual decla- 
 ration above noticed, that our Queen is a heretic 
 usurper, who must lose her crown if not her head on 
 the first opportunity, a spiritual announcement ! In 
 truth, it is this very masking of the temporal be- 
 neath the spiritual power, on the ground of which 
 she would claim indulgence, that forfeits all her 
 claims to it ; just as the skulking robber deserves 
 less mercy than the open manly one. It is therefore 
 no wonder that many good men are at this moment 
 asking, Is it a right use of liberty to extend it to a 
 system which denies it to all others : or of tolera- 
 tion, to grant it to a church which tolerates none 
 who dare think for themselves? But we would not 
 be intolerant even to Rome, though we thus speak. 
 We would have the world see that there is in Eu- 
 rope one glorious country which can afford to toler- 
 ate even her ; and the legislation we would now pro- 
 pose in no wise interferes with the sacred principles 
 of religious liberty. We would only demand, that 
 beneath the name of freedom we shall not have fa- 
 voritism, nor continue to endoiv what at most we 
 should only endure. And therefore two measures, 
 at least, we claim at the hands of the legislature : — 
 that Rome's " religious" prisons shall not be the only 
 ones on our soil exempt from public inspection ; and 
 that if she will be allowed to diffuse her poison 
 
TREATMENT LEGISLATION. 295 
 
 through the realm, she shall at least support its chief 
 manufactory herself. 
 
 The Convent. — " Retreats of piety" — how sweet 
 the sound ! None knows better than Rome " how 
 much is in a name" — Rome, that mistress of the 
 arts of nomenclature ; which calls her most villanous 
 order " the Society of Jesus" and her most infernal 
 tribunal " the holy office !" She is like other ser- 
 pents, generally most dangerous in her gayest fasci- 
 nations ; throws the most imposing drapery round 
 her most iniquitous scenes, and baptizes her foulest 
 deeds with the fairest titles. And oh ! how exem- 
 plified in the convent ! We have traced the young 
 female thither, and found her leaving her happiness 
 at the gate, and commencing a struggle with the 
 laws of her being compared to which crucifixion 
 were mercy. We have seen that unless the laws 
 of nature are a delusion, that young creature must 
 there stifle all the fond throbbings of a woman's 
 soul, commit suicide without the relief of dying, and 
 bury herself alive without finding that rest which the 
 grave usually brings to the weary. And this is Rome's 
 best oblation to heaven ! — her most transcendental 
 type of piety ! — to pluck the young heart out of the 
 gentle bosom, and attempt to replace it with a lump 
 of marble — to inflict upon its victim the feeling of 
 wretchedness, from which she can only escape by get- 
 ting rid of all feeling ! We now add, that it is the 
 nature of this gloomy prison-house to decoy those 
 
296 THE CURE. 
 
 young females whose hearts are least capable of 
 such petrifaction. It is the artless girl of pious 
 tendencies — the child of romance and sentiment — 
 whose glowing young fancy throws a halo round 
 everything, who is most easily ensnared by visions 
 of conventual bliss. And thus this dreadful old 
 sorceress not only drags the young female from life, 
 just when its vernal flowers are all bursting around 
 her ; but selects for the sacrifice the most precious 
 victim, and makes her very excellence and piety the 
 means of her decoy ! Ah ! fancy that girl's feelings 
 when the spell at length breaks — when she awakes, 
 and behold it was a dream — when the mirage melts 
 away, and she finds a dreary desert where she looked 
 for living waters ! Perhaps some simple Protestant 
 replies, " But I have been to convents, and the nuns 
 who showed us through them said they were all 
 so happy." And was there nothing suspicious in 
 the great pains they took to convince you of their 
 felicity? Then what mean those high walls and 
 iron gratings ? And why does a church so saga- 
 cious needlessly provoke suspicion, by giving such 
 paradises the air of prisons ? Ah ! think you there 
 is no occasion ? Then read the honest narrative of 
 one, who in England seemed favorable to Popery, 
 but went to Rome and was effectually cured. The 
 scenes Mr. Seymour describes as being at this 
 moment enacted in Italian nunneries are absolutely 
 heart-rending. One friend, in particular, who knew 
 several nuns, and was well acquainted with " the 
 
TREATMENT LEGISLATION. 297 
 
 secrets of their prison-house," assured liim that •' the 
 broken-hearted looks the shades of deep and indeli- 
 ble sorrow, the lines of settled and unalterable sad- 
 ness, the expression of resentment or despair that 
 characterized many of these young creatures, used 
 to affect his heart, sadden all his best feelings, and 
 trouble his very dreams. He could not think or 
 speak of the subject without such feelings, but that 
 the tears would come into his eyes, saying, that it 
 was inconceivable the number of nuns that went to 
 an early grave under this system." He assured 
 him that numbers of them, when the religious hectic 
 which brought them thither had subsided, and they 
 awoke to all the dreary realities of their state, " soon 
 pined and saddened, and, sinking into despair, died 
 of madness j" that this was " the melancholy destiny 
 of the greater portion, and that nothing on earth 
 could induce him, with the knowledge he possessed, 
 to allow one of his daughters to take the veil, for 
 that the majority of nuns at Rome died of madness 
 before tliey were five-and-twenty years of age! V* 
 
 Now think of hundreds in our own land annually 
 offered on this dreadful altar, flowers that might 
 have shed beauty and fragrance on their entire circle, 
 ruthlessly plucked in their first vernal buddings, and 
 consigned to those cells to droop and perish ! In 
 Ireland alone there are a hundred and thirteen 
 
 * Seymuurs Pilgrimage to Rome, p. 182. For a dis- 
 tressing account of the order of nuns called the Sepulie vive 
 or " the buried alive," see p. 188. 
 
298 THE CURE. 
 
 convents !* Throughout the entire United King- 
 dom they are rising on every hand ; and if Rome 
 had her will, these living sepulchres would cover the 
 empire. And for aught we can tell, those which al- 
 ready exist may be scenes of fearful vice and ruffian 
 violence. Maria Monk has revealed the abomina- 
 tions of the Montreal convent, and the Rev. Mr. 
 Slocum has proved the full truth of her disclosures. 
 The French soldiery found sixty-two young women 
 corrupted and ruined in the apartments of the 
 Inquisitors of Spain : and both French and Eng- 
 lish discovered manifold proofs of guilt on the prem- 
 ises of Peninsular convents. When Mr. Seymour 
 was at Rome, an abbess rushed forth in a frenzy 
 from one of the nunneries of that city, and sought 
 relief from remorse beneath the waves of the Tiber. 
 And what proof can you have that those crimes 
 which are rife in other convents have no existence in 
 ours — that their walls witness no villany, and hear 
 no cries of outraged innocence ? If we suspect them 
 wrongfully, the fault is their own ; for if all is right, 
 why is not all opcnl It is vice, not virtue, that 
 hates the light, and suffers from exposure ; and 
 piety, above all things, detests concealment, and 
 avoids even the "appearance of evil." " 0, but re- 
 ligion must not be interfered with !" Religion ! 
 that heavenly angel in whose outraged name Rome 
 does her darkest deeds, beneath whose skirt she al- 
 ways hides her guiltiest acts, burying them the deep- 
 
 * Catholic Directory, 1852. 
 
TREATMENT LEGISLATION. 299 
 
 er in its folds the more .truculent they are ! Reli- 
 gion ! which never yet concealed anything, because 
 it has nothing to conceal ! Religion ! which is used 
 as the decoy to these prisoners, is forsooth made the 
 plea for preventing their escape and concealing the 
 '■rimes of which they may be the victims ! Say, 
 shall that be taken as a valid plea, which is in truth 
 the darkest feature of the case ; and shall Rome be 
 permitted to transform religion into a jailer of female 
 innocence, and station her at every convent-door, to 
 prevent the entrance of justice, or the escape of woe ? 
 Then, fellow-Christians ! approach the feet of your 
 Queen, and pray that no convent shall be permitted 
 in her dominions without being open to inspection. 
 And if Rome shall be allowed to prowl through your 
 families, kidnap your daughters, and bear them off 
 to her fastnesses, there to be robbed of liberty, prop- 
 erty, and perhaps virtue too — to be tortured, it 
 may be, under the sweet name of " sister," and pos- 
 sibly ruined under the hallowed title of " saint" — to 
 endure actual misery beneath the mockery of pre- 
 tended bliss, and be compelled to smile while anguish 
 is eating their hearts ; — at least insist that these 
 dens shall be examined, and those who are injured 
 protected, and those who have " come to themselves" 
 allowed to go free. Shall Britain, which hunts the 
 man-stealer through every sea — whose fair soil no 
 slave can touch, but his chains burst from around 
 him — which breaks open the private dwelling to de- 
 liver the victim of wrong, punished the advocate 
 
300 THE CURE. 
 
 Sloane for abusing his little iiiaid-servant — and will 
 not permit one act of " cruelty" even to the lower 
 creation ; shall Britain show favor only to this moral 
 monster, and refuse relief to the helpless young fe- 
 males who shriek from its dens ? Shall Britain, 
 whose humanity sought for Stoddart amid the sands 
 of the East, and still seeks for Franklin amongst the 
 icebergs of the North ; — Britain, the asylum of the 
 earth's remotest exiles, permit her worst foe, on 
 pretences " false as hell," so far to abuse her hospi- 
 tality, and impose on her credulity, as to decoy and 
 incarcerate her own fair daughters, on her own fair 
 soil, without a chance of escape — and for no other 
 crime than their artless innocence and religious en- 
 thusiasm ? 
 
 The College. — After all we have said of Irish 
 priests, the offspring, we need not surely say much 
 of Maynooth, the parent ; nor enter its gloomy 
 walls to discover its genuine character. Every effect 
 has its adequate cause ; and to judge correctly of a 
 fountain, it is enough to examine its streams. We 
 care very little what interested witnesses may testify, 
 or official visitors see ; while our reason remains 
 we must judge of the tree by its fruits, and if, on 
 visiting days, all looks lovely and charming within 
 Maynooth College, it is only another proof, not of 
 Rome's innocence, but her serpent cunning. 
 
 And why should we look for any thing else ? Could 
 we expect a seminary for heralds of darkness to be 
 
TREATMENT LEGISLATION. 301 
 
 radiant with light, or a school for patrons of pollu- 
 tion to be redolent of purity ? Would the father of 
 this system take such pains to mould the people to his 
 will, and be careless only about those by idiom he 
 chiefly moulds them 1 Would lie who is so watchful 
 of his prisoners, be neglectful only of his turnkeys > 
 No ; as sure as Rome is Satan's masterpiece, it is in 
 the training of her priestlwod you would naturally 
 look for his deepest strokes of policy, and expect to 
 see the art of blasting souls practised in its highest 
 branches. Let us see how far these expectations 
 are realized in the present case. Imagine the great 
 adversary devising such a college as would best suit 
 his dreadful purpose ; and his aim would clearly be 
 to contrive such an one as would most thoroughly 
 subjugate the minds of the priests, and, at tlw same 
 time, best fit them for subjugating those of the 
 people. It is clear that to accomplish this difficult 
 task he would give the former enough instruction to 
 raise them just so far above the latter as to enable 
 them thoroughly to enslave them, but no farther-*- 
 enough to make them fiery zealots, but not enough 
 to liberalize their minds ; in a word, such an educa- 
 tion as would qualify them for mischief, but not such 
 as would fit them for usefulness. Now, you have 
 only to bear this single fact in mind, in order to have 
 the most perfect key to the entire history, instruc- 
 tions, and character of Maynooth College. 
 
 First look to its history. Rome long sighed for 
 such a college in Ireland, for France being a much 
 
>02 THE CURE. 
 
 more enlightened country, its colleges were necessa- 
 rily too good for her purposes in Ireland ; hence 
 those Irish priests who had been brought up in 
 France returned home far 1<><> liberal and enlightened 
 for her oty'ects ! A domestic college, therefore, be- 
 came indispensable ; and one enjoying the smiles of 
 Government was most desirable. Now, mark her 
 consummate policy. In 1793, Drs. Troy and O'Reilly 
 assured Mr. Pitt that if their priests continued to be 
 educated in France, they would all return revolution- 
 ists ; but if he endowed a college for them at home, 
 such a college would prevent their exposure to the 
 political corruption of foreign governments, and such 
 an endowment would ensure their loyalty to their 
 own ! Such was their argument at the very time 
 when they were members of a secret society which 
 was hatching the rebellion of 1798!! Pitt seized 
 the idea, vainly thinking that whatever contributed 
 to make the priests independent of their flocks 
 would weaken by so much their moral influence 
 among them ! It was thus a plot and a counterplot ; 
 but priest-craft proved an overmatch for state-craft. 
 Forgetting that Rome's influence was not moral, but 
 superstitious ; that her slaves were chained to her, 
 not by respect for her character, but dread of her 
 ghostly power ; and that the way to emancipate them 
 was, not to endow Iter, but to enlighten them ; — for- 
 getting this, if he ever knew it, the premier was out- 
 witted by the priest, and that ill-omened child of Grod- 
 dishonoring expediency was born in 1795. It is now, 
 
TREATMENT LEGISLATION. 303 
 
 therefore, 57 years old ; and if its days Lave not 
 been "few," they have verily been "evil." Never 
 was that retributive decree more terribly fulfilled — 
 " Be sure your sin will find you out." With this col- 
 lege was to commence the reign of Peace in Ireland ; 
 the Olive-tree was to bloom on every hill, and that 
 worse brood of serpents than any St. Patrick ex- 
 pelled was to be charmed into perfect innocence by 
 the incantations of the Treasury. Maynooth, in short, 
 was to be a spring of healing waters amongst us ; but 
 instead of this, it has proved " a cauldron of seething 
 horrors, around which are squatted the old hags of 
 treason, disaffection, and agrarian outrage ; and this 
 has been the chorus of their song — 
 
 " Double, double, toil and trouble." * 
 
 Look next to its course of instruction, and you 
 will find Satan pursuing with singular exactness the 
 same plan of debasement with the priest that we 
 have seen him pursue with the people, only, of course, 
 on a more refined and subtle scale ; and that the en- 
 tire system of Maynooth training is manifestly con- 
 trived to cramp the mind, destroy the conscience, 
 shrivel the Jieart, degrade the ivhole nature, and 
 hence to send forth just such an ignorant, depraved, 
 turbulent, and vulgar priesthood as now infest the 
 land. 
 
 If you look to its mental training, to judge by its 
 programme, it would seem most respectable ; but we 
 * Rev. Mr. Goold, at. Edinburgh Anti-Maynooth Meeting. 
 
304 THE CURE. 
 
 need only apply the infallible test of actual attain- 
 ment to find its real character. For example, its 
 professor of natural philosophy confessed before the 
 committee of inquiry, that he was not certain if 
 more than two thirds of his students could at the 
 end of the session demonstrate the 47th proposition 
 of the first book of Euclid ! — that he thought the 
 majority of them could tell the cause of an eclipse ! ! 
 — and that he himself ; ' did not know the: subject- 
 matter of Euclid's sixth book ! ! !"* Should this 
 not satisfy you, kind reader, you need only examine 
 our priests themselves, and you will find them, of all 
 professional men, the most ignorant as a class. 
 Nothing can be more extraordinary than many of 
 their effusions, both oral and written. The follow- 
 ing specimen is, we assure you, little in comparison 
 to what we might adduce. It is a reply to a note 
 sent by a Protestant missionary to a Popish priest 
 — whom the author had not long ago to summon for 
 flogging one of his scholars — inviting him to attend 
 a controversial lecture : — : ' The Rev. Mr. Harring- 
 ton presents his compliments to Rev. D. Foley, and 
 begs to return his circular. The Rev. Mr. Harring- 
 ton objects to the lecture for two reasons : first, lie 
 has not lime to clo so, for twelve o'clock is the hour 
 appointed for him by the holy Roman Catholic 
 Church to celebrate the holy sacrifice of the mass, 
 and preach a moral discourse to his Christian hear- 
 
 * Evidence of Rev. Nicholas Callen, D.D., Irish Education 
 Report, viii., App pp. 146-148. 
 
TREATMENT LEGISLATION. 305 
 
 ers , secondly, Rev. Mr. Harrington, finding from 
 •the orthography in the circular that the lecture can- 
 not be orthodox, lacks inclination to be present at 
 any lecture coming from that quarter. — Castletown, 
 January 27th, 1349 ! F'* 
 
 Look next to Maynootlrs moral training. Its 
 principal class-books are those depositories of vile- 
 ness — Delahogne and Bailly. The former, for in- 
 stance, telling us under what circumstances stealing 
 is no sin ; and the latter teaching that the church 
 has full power to absolve from oaths " when the honor 
 of God the goad of the church, or tlie good of society 
 requires it" and that '•'• tlie siqyerioi's of tlie church 
 are to be tlie judges in all cases .'"f Indeed, if you 
 look into tlie Eighth "Report of the Education Com- 
 mission of Inquiry, you will find the witnesses 
 obliged to acknowledge, despite all the shuffling they 
 could resort to, that in Maynooth everything is fully 
 taught which is dishonoring to Grod, subversive of 
 morality, and ruinous to society, in the Popish sys- 
 tem ; and how could it be otherwise in a Popish 
 college? Yes; and while, according to one of the 
 professors there were a few years ago only ten Bi- 
 bles among 400 students, each is required to pur- 
 chase Bailly and Dclahogue, and every week to give 
 9 hours to them in class, and 48 hours in prepara- 
 
 * Missionary Tour through South and West of Ireland. 
 By Rev. D. Foley. 
 
 f Delahogue Tract, de Praecept. Decalogi, pp. 232-236 ; 
 Bailly's Moral Theology, vol. ii. p. 140. 
 
 20 
 
306 THE CURE. 
 
 tion. They are, therefore, the consta it companions 
 of the student, and over their foul images he is 
 compelled for hours to pore, at that age when his 
 passions are strongest. No wonder an emancipated 
 student declared,, that " such an effect had they on 
 his mind, as nearly to drive him into a species of 
 delirium ! and that in order to save himself from the 
 effects of his own feelings, he has gone down on a 
 cold winter's morning into the chapel of the institu- 
 tion, and there remained till nearly chilled to death 
 reading them on his knees, and praying the while 
 that he might be kept from the evil emotions they 
 suggested to his mind."* Is it strange that when 
 the mental and the moral of the Irish priest are so 
 blasted, the animal of his nature should have such 
 complete ascendency ? 
 
 Observe, again, the influence of Maynooth on his 
 Jieart. He must now learn to become an isolated 
 being, to whom domestic joys are a sinful thought ; 
 and that vow of celibacy is here taken which nips in 
 the bud the best feelings of his nature, and sends its 
 blight through his whole soul. Everything is con- 
 trived to dry up the springs of affection to Grod and 
 man. Witness those morose austerities ; witness 
 that Breviary, of which he must daily read 30 to 40 
 pages, and whose endless repetition must create for- 
 mality, and hypocrisy, if not utter disgust at devo- 
 tion. Witness the silence which is strictly enforced, 
 sometimes for weeks together ; and, during most of 
 
 * Ireland in 1846, p. 34. 
 
TREATMENT LEGISLATION. 307 
 
 the year, for 21-£ hours out of the 24.* Witness the 
 suspicious surveillance which never allows fewer than 
 three students together, that the third may be a spy 
 on the other two ; and to evade which, one student 
 often stands inside a door, and the other outside, in 
 order to whisper through the pannels ! 
 
 Observe, finally, the system of subjugation here 
 pursued. Implicit obedience is the first command- 
 ment. The grand maxim of the college is, that each 
 student must ''• think as his superior thinks." And 
 to this great centre-point, breaking cloivn the mind 
 to the wiU of ot/terSj all is made to converge. Only 
 think of such a system pursued for seven years of 
 that }^outhful period when the mind is most plastic, 
 with but the annual interruption of six weeks' vaca- 
 tion ! And so constant is its influence, that the stu- 
 dents are seldom allowed outside the gates, save for 
 a walk on Wednesdays, and even then they are 
 watched by tutors lest the fearful process should be 
 suspended for an hour. 
 
 Now, if so much of this evil system is thus reveal- 
 ed to public gaze, despite the profound secrecy which 
 Rome in all things observes, what might you expect 
 to find if admitted to the inmost 'penetralia of May- 
 nooth ? And considering this fact in the light of 
 the above details, can any sane man doubt that the 
 same plan by which Rome destroys the people, is 
 here pursued with more malignant subtlety ; until, 
 by the time the victim is made a priest, he has ceas- 
 
 * Tract on Maynooth by Eugene Francis O'Beirne. 
 
308 THE onnE. 
 
 ed to be a man. and by this spiritual Medusa is 
 turned into stone ? You think this picture colored 1 
 It must be the reverse. Unless Maynooth is a very 
 den of corruption, will you inform ns how its priests 
 are usually so bad ? or where they learn their wick- 
 edness? How else can you explain that they so 
 generally go in raw youths, and come out social fire- 
 brands 1 We care not what annual reports of May- 
 nooth may say : they are its reports — its " living 
 epistles :" and if you would know assuredly what its 
 teachings are, you need only look to their practice. 
 Behold their very countenances ! — what specimens 
 commonly of the " human face divine !" And if you 
 pronounce the scowl that sits on a villain's brow to 
 be just the mirror of his bosom — the collective 
 daguerreotype of the thousand dark thoughts of his 
 soul — say. is this " index of the mind" to be read 
 backwards in the priest's case only ? Is he the only 
 exception to the laws of physiognomy ? And think 
 you was the artless face of the boy transformed into 
 the " down look" of the priest by nothing but seven 
 years' converse with his G-od ? — or that deep scowl 
 from which infant innocence would instinctively flee, 
 acquired by naught but scenes of heavenly rapture ? 
 And what shall we call it ? — credulity % fatuity ? or 
 that sheer depravity which has so strong an affinity 
 for whatever is depraved % which to this hour de- 
 fends or palliates the monstrous sin of the world's 
 most Protestant nation endowiug such a college? 
 And this, when ignorance of Roue's iniquitous de- 
 
TREATMENT LEGISLATION. 309 
 
 signs can no longer be pleaded. — when, from its re- 
 cent agitations, the cesspool of Popery is now send- 
 ing up its stench over Europe. — when, by our late 
 premier's own confession, the ranks of darkness, led 
 on by Rome, are now preparing to close in around 
 Protestant England ! This, too, when not only have 
 the blessings Maynooth was to yield us not been 
 realized, but- we have had instead unmitigated curse, 
 — when, in place of rearing doves, as was promised 
 us, it has only been hatching cockatrices, — and when 
 even the cowardly plea of fear of the priests can no 
 longer be urged, since they are fast growing utterly 
 powerless, and will in a few years have completely 
 lost their sting ! 
 
 Nor is Maynooth merely aided by the nation — it 
 enjoys an amount of favor which is denied our very 
 best universities. There you see an extensive pile 
 of building, enclosed in a park of 100 acres, with 
 gardens, walks, and play-grounds ; containing num- 
 berless apartments for professors and students, be- 
 sides dining-hall, chapel, and library of 10,000 vol- 
 umes ; with a staff consisting of a president, vice- 
 president, bursar, two deans, librarian, Dunboyne 
 prefect, and ten professors ; not to mention a train 
 of servants, including a butcher, baker, and brewer — 
 and all maintained at the public cost ! And there 
 you find 500 students, generally of the lowest class ; 
 their cabin costume exchanged for a black suit, with 
 long black gaiters ; and themselves, from having in 
 their humble homes " cultivated letters on a little 
 
310 THE CURE. 
 
 oatmeal,' 1 now amply supplied with smoking joints 
 and potations of ale, and receiving besides £20 a-year 
 of pocket- money ! ! Why, if the strength and glory 
 of the British empire were bound up in those 500 — 
 if they were destined to be her shield and stay, in- 
 stead of her tormentors, they could not be the ob- 
 jects of more bountiful regard. And while these 
 embryo pests of society are thus dandled on the lap 
 of royal favor, how many of its future ornaments 
 are left to ply the trowel or the shuttle one half of 
 the year in order to support themselves at college 
 the remainder ! Can the history of folly present 
 anything like this? The world's most Protestant 
 nation supporting Popery ; and the very worst kind 
 of it, Irish Popery ; and in the very worst form, a 
 college — not the hornets, but the nest to hatch 
 them in ! This nation, continuing the grant de- 
 spite the utter failure of all the ends for which it was 
 given ; increasing it, too, as the mischief increases ; 
 and, in 1845, permanently endowing it with £30,000 
 a-year ! Ay, and now liesitating to withdraw this 
 endowment, despite the clearest proof that by its 
 continuance they are only fattening the tiger which 
 thirsts for their blood ! In a word, the most free 
 and enlightened nation in Europe fostering the 
 worst form of darkness and despotism ; the great 
 patroness of all good, nursing Satan's masterpiece 
 of evil ; and the most sagacious of nations continu- 
 ing to rear the viper just after it has disclosed its 
 deadly designs by making a dart at her bosom ! ' 
 
TREATMENT LEGISLATION. 311 
 
 And what are the pleas we hear urged for this 1 
 v - Popery is the prevailing religion in Ireland. 1 ' 1 
 Yes, and so is Hinduism in India ! a But we ought, 
 to show some kindness to our Roman Catholic 
 brethren" What ! by cherishing the delusion which, 
 according to your own creed, is soul-destroying ! 
 '■•But they are poor, and need, a college" They who 
 have thirteen colleges in Ireland, including Carlow 
 and Clongowes, need another! — and they who can 
 raise any sums for mischief, and have now factiously 
 commenced a Popish university, cannot support it I 
 "O, but they contribute their share of the revenve, 
 and it is just they should get a share like otliers." 
 Have we not shown that Protestantism gains, and 
 Popery costs the nation far more than the amount 
 of all our endowments together ? And because the 
 former gets back a fraction of what it gains the 
 country, the latter, forsooth, must be endowed for 
 impoverishing it ! "But, tlien, the nation is pledged 
 to this grant." And suppose it were so, if we pledge 
 ourselves to what dishonors God and destroys the 
 country, verily the sooner we break our pledge the 
 better ; for such a pledge we had no power to 
 make, and the sin is in the keeping, not the break- 
 ing of it. But the allegation is utterly false. Till 
 1845, this grant was annual — abundant proof that 
 before that elate there could have been no pledge ; 
 since tlien, it rests on a mere Act of Parliament, 
 and a thousand better acts have been repealed ! 
 A.nd, as is well known, that act — hurried through 
 
312 THE CURE. 
 
 the legislature, our readers will guess why — was 
 passed, as Sir R. Peel admitted, in the face of a 
 reclaiming nation, only 17,000 individuals having 
 petitioned for it, while 1,284,000 petitioned against 
 it; so that if ever there was an act which the very 
 justice they talk of required to be repealed, it is 
 this offspring of our violated constitution ! But 
 what is that cry which comes from a very different 
 quarter 1 ? ' 'By withdrawing this grant™ say some 
 of our Protestants, -yoir/f endanger all endow- 
 ments." Well, and suppose it were so, have you 
 really, in the dazzle of your endowment, lost sight 
 of the honor of your God ? But we assert it is just 
 the reverse. The greatest danger to an endowment 
 that is right in principle, is to place alongside of it 
 one that is wrong. And so, has not the Maynooth 
 grant given the Voluntary his best argument 1 Only 
 let all endowments be righteous, and the strongest 
 plea against them would cease ; but it is this indis- 
 criminate support of truth and error that lias fur- 
 nished the strongest handle to the adversary. There- 
 fore, let Protestants beware ! " The path of duty 
 is the path of safety ;" and should any such motives 
 of God-dishonoring selfishness weaken their opposi- 
 tion to this grant, their wisdom may prove their 
 folly, and their sin provoke the Most High to send 
 the evil it was designed to prevent. 
 
 Then let us arise and demand the repeal of this 
 suicidal act, regardless of the canting cry which 
 Rome may raise of " intolerance" and " persecution." 
 
 • 
 
TREATMENT LEGISLATION. 3 1 ! 
 
 Intolerance, forsooth ! So, then, not to help is to 
 hinder, not to pension is to persecute ! You detect 
 a man foully abusing your hospitality, and, while 
 eating your bread, forming a design against your 
 life; and instead of sending him to prison, you 
 merely tell him he must no longer sit at your table 
 — and that is persecution ! ! This, too, from Rome 
 —who, while demanding toleration from all men, 
 denies it to all men. — will not tolerate a Protestant 
 chapel within the gates of her capital, — lately refused 
 a Protestant stranger a grave to bury his wife in. — 
 and is even now banishing those of her subjects who 
 would dare read the Bible to the pestilent swamps 
 of Maremma ! Ay, and some of our Protestants 
 are found to echo the cry, and prove their fitness 
 for the office of " guardians of toleration," by the 
 strangest partialities for its deadliest foe ! If we 
 sent Wiseman back to the Flaminian Grate, and 
 required that till a Protestant chapel were allowed 
 in Rome, not a Popish one should stand in London ; 
 and that till the Bible were free in Italy, the Bre- 
 viary should be banished from England ; — if, in 
 short, we demanded measure for measure, would 
 Rome even then have any right to complain? We 
 must, then, plainly teach her — and all her Protes- 
 tant abettors, too — that she has good cause to be 
 thankful we now ask so little : and that should our 
 rulers continue to trifle with the feelings of a Chris- 
 tian nation, it is not with this humble measure of 
 defence they will be satisfied. No ; as sure as 
 
314 THE CURE. 
 
 delayed justice increases a people's demands, will 
 they require more sweeping legislation. Men are 
 beginning already to ask whether it is right to toler- 
 ate a system which will tolerate none but itself; or 
 safe to endure a thing which will endure nothing 
 else. And should the question come to be, not 
 whether Popery should be supported, but whether 
 it should be suffered, the responsibility of raising it 
 will rest with the men who shall now resist the 
 nation's moderate demands. 
 
 And should rulers continue to disregard the na- 
 tion's voice, then, fellow-Christians, will another duty 
 devolve on you, which, we believe, you have long 
 most grievously neglected. You have, in times past, 
 allowed Satan to choose the rulers of these Chris- 
 tian lands, and thus entailed incalculable mischief 
 on the Redeemer's cause. Had you always done 
 your duty, and chosen G-od-f earing men to represent 
 you, what might now have been the country's state ? 
 How many a glorious cause have you toon over the 
 land and lost in the Legislature ! Was not this the 
 case with this very Maynooth endowment? Yes, 
 here has been one fruitful source of all our calami- 
 ties. As if we were not bound to serve God in the 
 State as well as in the Church, in our capacity of 
 citizens as well as of saints, we have let the govern- 
 ment of this Christian country fall into the hands 
 of men whose highest rule of conduct is unprincipled 
 expediency, and who, for their own despicable ends, 
 continue to provoke Heaven's judgments by giving 
 
THE TREATMENT EVANGELIZATION. 315 
 
 her power to the beast. Then, fellow- Christians, 
 arise, and no longer commit the sin of allowing such 
 men to rule over us, nor the folly of taking such 
 trouble about meetings and petitions, to have botli 
 disregarded by your own representatives. But take 
 a lesson from Rome's election struggles ; and take 
 warning by the Catholic Defence Association, who 
 seem fully resolved to fill the next Parliament with 
 their tools, at whatever cost to the country of blood 
 and violence. 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 THE TREATMENT EVANGELIZATION. 
 
 Here is the grand hope of Ireland ! It is little 
 after all which Parliament or even the public can 
 do. They can, at the best, but facilitate somewhat 
 the flow of the tides of salvation in our land, as the 
 wind sometimes increases the tides of our harbors ; 
 but in both cases the grand influence must come 
 from above. Popery, like its father the devil, can 
 only be foiled by " the sword of the Spirit," and de- 
 stroyed by the " breath of God's mouth, and the 
 brightness of his coining." But, as has been truly 
 said, Ireland has never yet had its Reformation. If 
 history can be relied on, never was country more 
 neglected by clergymen and laymen. Many a par- 
 ish is still strewn with the wrecks of ministerial un- 
 
316 THE CURE. 
 
 faithfulness ; and when '•' God uiaketh inquisition for 
 blood," dread will be the reckoning of many a hire- 
 ling pastor and godless Protestant ! Oh ! how- 
 many a minister has given too much ground for the 
 charge of caring only for the fleece ! How many a 
 layman has been more sinful, with less excuse than 
 Rome's worst votaries ! And how often have both 
 exhibited religion, not in its own lovely aspect, but 
 the grim features of bigotry, or the marble coldness 
 of death ! True, the priests have poisoned our coun- 
 trymen, but we have starved them — they have 
 u shamefully handled" them, but we have " passed 
 them by on the other side." Yet you wonder the 
 Irish still remain unevangelized ! But, blessed be 
 God, a better day has dawned, and now almost 
 every denomination has begun to do something for 
 Ireland. 
 
 The Instruments. — For the reader's informa- 
 tion, we shall notice the principal organizations. 
 1st, The Independent Body, composed of the mem- 
 bers of the Congregational Union and the Irish 
 Evangelical Society, and consisting of 24 ministers 
 and missionaries, actively employed in various parts 
 of the country. 2d, Lady Huntingdon's Connec- 
 tion, employing a number of Scripture readers, un- 
 der the direction of ministers of various denomina- 
 tions. 3d, The Ladies 1 Hibernian Female Sehool 
 Society, which annually expends about £2000 in the 
 religious and general instruction of female children. 
 &th, The Irish Society, for instructing the native 
 
THE TREATMENT EVANGELIZATION. 317 
 
 Irish through the medium of their own tongue, 
 established in the year 1826, supported by members 
 of the Church of England, and at present employing 
 59 readers and 719 teachers. 5th, The Scripture 
 Readers' Society, established in 1822, and at present 
 employing 84 readers, and expending upwards of 
 £2000 a year. 6th, The Irish Island Society, con- 
 nected with the Established Church, which employs 
 about 25 readers and teachers on the islands and 
 coasts, and has brought the gospel within reach of 
 about 13,000 souls. 7th, T/ie Sunday School So- 
 ciety for Ireland, which, since its establishment in 
 1809, has disseminated 954.122 copies of the Scrip- 
 tures, with 114.286 portions, and 1,400,935 Scrip- 
 ture reading-books, &c. This admirable society 
 numbers at present about 3000 schools and 226,000 
 scholars. 8th, The Hibernian Bible Society, which, 
 from its commencement in 1806, has issued 1,913,857 
 Bibles, Testaments, and portions. 9th, The Reli 
 gious Tract Society for Ireland, which, since 1819, 
 has issued near 10,000 books and tracts, and estab- 
 lished 1,162 depositories and lending libraries. 
 \0th, The Primitive Wesleyan Connection, which 
 has at present near 50 circuit preachers, and 40 
 missionary agents in Ireland. Wth, The Hibernian 
 Wesleyan Society, containing 158 preachers, 25 mis- 
 sionaries, and 62 schoolmasters. With the labors 
 of both these societies, we are intimately acquainted ; 
 and find it impossible to speak of them in terms of 
 sufficient praise. We have traced them through 
 
318 THE CURE. 
 
 almost every part of the country, and found them 
 penetrating its wildest regions, and holding up the 
 lamp of truth in its darkest corners, regardless alike 
 of persecution and privation. 12th, The Irish Bap- 
 tist Society, containing at present about 24 ministers 
 and missionaries, who are actively laboring in various 
 parts of the country. 13th, T)ie Church Educa- 
 tion Society for Ireland, which, in 1851, had 1882 
 schools, and 108,450 scholars on the roll, with an 
 average attendance of 64,647. 14^, T/ie Home 
 Mission of the Irish Presbyterian Church. This 
 church at present consists of 5 synods, 36 presby- 
 teries, 522 ministers, 483 congregations and mission 
 stations, and about 750,000 souls. Within the last 
 16 years, it has planted about 160 new churches in 
 destitute localities; established a number of mission 
 stations and out-stations in the south and west ; 
 supported from 300 to 400 Irish and English mis- 
 sion schools, in which upwards of 20,000 Roman 
 Catholics have been taught to read the Scriptures ; 
 and circulated large numbers of Bibles and tracts in 
 Popish districts. There are, besides, 25 Reformed 
 Presbyterian ministers in Ireland, and 15 or 20 dis- 
 tinguished by the name of Seceders. 
 
 Of course, it is impossible to give full details of 
 the operations of so many societies. We must con- 
 fine ourselves to those of the two chief Protestant 
 Churches of Ireland, and let these serve as samples 
 of the labors of the remainder. One of the princi- 
 pal agencies of the Established Church is tJve Irish 
 
THE TREATMENT EVANGELIZATION. 319 
 
 Society. Before the famine of 1846, there were 
 supposed to be 3.000,000 of Irish-speaking Roman 
 Catholics in the country. And this society, availing 
 itself of their proverbial attachment to their own 
 simple and beautiful language, has extended its 
 operations through many parts of the country, and 
 been blessed with much success. The wonderful 
 power of the Irish tongue on the Irish heart, and 
 hence the influence of this agency, may be judged of 
 by the following anecdote. Some years ago, when 
 one of its most active members was preaching in the 
 courthouse of Athlone, four priests stationed them- 
 selves at the door, and commenced taking down the 
 names of those Roman Catholics who entered. This 
 kept the people back for a little. But having col- 
 lected in force, they made a rush to the door, and 
 the priests were not only borne down, but carried 
 before them into the building ! The candles had 
 just been lighted, and one of the priests coolly re- 
 sumed the task of noting the names of the people. 
 This being observed by one of them, he called out 
 — " Mr. Gregg, can you preach in the dark as well 
 as in the light?" "I can," was the reply. In a 
 moment every candle was puffed out, and the people 
 were enabled, in spite of the priest, to hear the glad 
 tidings of salvation. We can only now find space 
 for one instance of this society's success. Amongst 
 the leading persecutors of its teachers at Kings- 
 court, some years ago, was Mr. Nolan, the young 
 coadjutor of the parish priest. His inflammatory 
 
320 THE CURE. 
 
 harangues having mainly led to the murder of one 
 or two agents, he was obliged to remove to a neigh- 
 boring village ; and there he commenced to study 
 the Scriptures, the better to fit himself for the 
 defence of Rome. The goodness of God arrested 
 the persecutor ; he soon read himself out of the 
 errors of Popery, and that furious bigot became one 
 of the most devoted servants of God. 
 
 Two of the most interesting colonies in Ireland 
 are Dingle, in the county Kerry, and the island 
 of Achill, in the county Mayo ; both connected with 
 the Established Church. In the year 1831, the 
 Rev. George Gubbins was appointed curate of 
 Dingle. At this time there was in the district 
 neither church nor school-house ; and this excellent 
 man lived in a cabin at one shilling per week, and 
 had stated services in the private dwellings around. 
 In about a year after, the district was visited and 
 fearfully ravaged by the cholera. There being no 
 physician to apply to, Mr. Gubbins became phy- 
 sician-general to the poor ; and his kindness during 
 a crisis so awful won the people's affections, and pre- 
 pared the way for the harvest which soon followed. 
 In 1833, the Rev. Charles Gayer arrived in the dis- 
 trict ; the following year several of the inhabitants, 
 including two Popish priests, renounced the Romish 
 faith ; upwards of 150 families have since followed 
 their example. Some time ago, the colony consisted 
 of 800 converts ; and notwithstanding the brutal 
 persecution to which its present excellent missionary, 
 
THE TREATMENT EVANGELIZATION. 321 
 
 Mr. Lewis, has been subjected, and the extensive 
 emigration of the people of that district, it now con- 
 sists of 1200. Amongst the many cheering instances 
 of the Divine blessing on the labors of these mis- 
 sionaries, we may mention that of Mr. Moriarty, the 
 present curate of Ventry, who was once a bigoted 
 Romanist, and went on one occasion into a congre- 
 gation on purpose to disturb them in their devotions ; 
 and who, while waiting for the moment when he 
 should commence his interruptions, received such 
 impressions from the truth he heard, as ultimately 
 led to his conversion. 
 
 Achill is the largest island on the coast of Ireland. 
 It stands on the extreme west of Mayo, is washed by 
 the billows of the Atlantic, and consists of mountain 
 and bog, interspersed with small patches of culti- 
 vated land. Being visited with famine in 1831, the 
 Rev. Edward Nangle took charge of a cargo of pota- 
 toes sent to its relief. Having found the people 
 willing to listen to the truth, he conceived the de- 
 sign of founding amongst them a colony on the Mo- 
 ravian plan ; and, with the full countenance of the 
 principal proprietor of the island, and the cordial aid 
 of numerous Christian friends, he soon after founded 
 '• the Colony of Achill." A wild tract of moor has 
 now been reclaimed, and a number of cottages have 
 been erected upon it for the colonists ; a neat church 
 and school-house stand in the interesting little vil- 
 lage : several families and individuals have renounced 
 the errors of Popery ; the young generation are 
 
 21 
 
322 THE CURE. 
 
 growing up a different class of beings from what 
 their progenitors were : the sides of the once barren 
 mountain are now adorned with cultivated fields and 
 gardens ; most of the island has lately been pur- 
 chased by the friends of the colony, at a cost of 
 £17,000 ; and thus the gospel will in future have 
 "free course and be glorified" in a spot which for 
 ages has slumbered in the midnight of Popery ! 
 
 The Home Mission of the Irish Presbyterian 
 Church has two departments of operation — the one 
 is entirely devoted to the evangelization of Roman 
 Catholics ; while the other aims to supply the spir- 
 itual wants of the Protestant population generally, 
 and the Presbyterian especially. The mission to 
 Roman Catholics is again divided into two branches, 
 one to the E iiglish-sjieaking and the other to the 
 Irish-speaking Romanist. The Birr mission is an 
 example of the former. It was commenced in 1840; 
 and owed its existence to the singular circumstance 
 of a congregation of Roman Catholics having, with 
 their pastor, spontaneously sought connection with 
 the Irish Presbyterian Church. 
 
 The Rev. Messrs. Crotty, the priests of Birr or 
 Parsonstown, King's County, had long entertained 
 doubts of the soundness of their system ; and their 
 final renunciation of it was brought about by the 
 following circumstances : — The " holy oil" with which 
 extreme unction is performed, must always come 
 through the hands of the bishop. But the Messrs. 
 Crotty having had some dispute with their diocesan, 
 
THE TREATMENT EVANGELIZATION. 323 
 
 in order to avoid the necessity of applying to him 
 for oil, began to study the Scriptures in quest of 
 some other channel through which to obtain it ! 
 There they found that bishop and presbyter were 
 terms to signify the same office. This discovery led 
 them to search the divine volume with redoubled 
 eagerness ; and the result may be easily guessed. 
 They soon got rid of " holy oil" altogether — the 
 " holy water" shortly followed — the " candles" by 
 and by disappeared — the confessional came next to 
 be closed — and the " mass" itself was finally abolish- 
 ed. Thus did these two cousins grope their way, 
 step by step, out of the delusions of Popery, with 
 the lamp of truth their only guide, until its last en- 
 closure was passed. But being unable to lead their 
 people out of error as fast as they themselves felt 
 bound to travel, every new reform caused a new se- 
 cession ; until, from a large congregation with which 
 they set out from Rome, they could only muster 
 about a hundred followers when they arrived at the 
 end of their toilsome journey. In 1839, William 
 Crotty, with the congregation, joined the Presbyte- 
 rian Church ; and in the following year, Dr. Car- 
 lisle of Dublin, undertook the superintendence of the 
 " Birr Mission." It now consists of a congregation 
 of converts, with an average Sabbath attendance of 
 about 70 individuals, flourishing Sabbath schools of 
 about 127 children, with 136 scholars in the daily 
 schools. About 500 Roman Catholic families are 
 visited by the readers ; and so promising is this field 
 
 *r 
 
324 THE CURE. 
 
 of labor, that Dr. Wallace, a young Scotch physi- 
 cian, has for some time been laboring as medical 
 missionary in the neighborhood. 
 
 The principal agencies of our mission to the Irish- 
 speaking Roman Catholics, are the Irish mission- 
 ary, the Irish Scripture reader, said the Irish school. 
 The latter consists, not of children assembled in a 
 school-house during certain fixed hours, but of per- 
 sons of all ages and both sexes, assembled to learn 
 the Irish Scriptures in each other's houses, generally 
 after the toils of the day. And 3011 might see these 
 little groups of mountain peasants during the long 
 winter nights around their blazing bogwood fires, 
 reading in " their own tongue the wonderful works 
 of Grod !" A better proof of the blessed fruits of 
 these schools it is impossible to furnish, than what 
 is found in the following anecdote. About 1 4 years 
 ago, there dwelt a young zealous Romanist on the 
 mountains of Tyrone. Being a youth of talent, he 
 held frequent discussions with the Irish teachers of 
 the district ; and that he might be thoroughly fur- 
 nished for the controversy, he commenced to study 
 the Scriptures. The more he studied, the more he 
 doubted; and such were his mental struggles, that 
 he would spend hours at a time on the solitary 
 mountains behind his father's house, in such agony 
 of thought and prayer, that the cold sweat would 
 break on his temples. At length he resolved to go 
 to Stewartstown to hear the Rev. Robert Allen 
 preach. His text on that occasion was, " And the 
 
THE TREATMENT EVANGELIZATION. 325 
 
 Spirit and the bride say come," &c, and little did 
 lie dream the results that were to follow that ser- 
 mon. He drew the bow at a venture — the Most 
 High directed the arrow — and the young man left 
 the church a Protestant, and we trust a Christian 
 He was taken up by a few Christian ladies, educated, 
 and at length ordained. And that young peasant is 
 now the Rev. Michael Brannigan. one of the most 
 honored instruments in the great missionary move- 
 ment at present going on in the province of Con- 
 naught, and of which we now proceed to give a brief 
 account. 
 
 Until the period of the late famine, our church's 
 mission to Irish Romanists was. like all its sister in- 
 stitutions, progressing steadily but slowly, and ex- 
 periencing the peculiar difficulties of this field of la- 
 bor. But while that fearful calamity was sweeping 
 thousands to the grave, a most remarkable change 
 began to take place in the minds and conduct of 
 many of the people ; mainly owing, under God, to 
 the softening influence of affliction on their hearts, 
 and the kindness shown them by Protestants during 
 their trials. Not only were our missionaries admit- 
 ted to the cabins of those who before would have 
 shut their doors against them, but so anxious for in- 
 struction had they apparently become, that wherever 
 a new school or preaching station was opened, it was 
 crowded by young and old. The result lias been, 
 that, for the last six years, the mission has flourish- 
 ed so wonderfully, that, in the district of Mayo alone, 
 
326 THE CURE. 
 
 embracing an extent of 50 square miles, many thou- 
 sands of young and old have been gladly receiving 
 the Word: and, by the united testimony of all our 
 missionaries, the glorious work seems to be capable 
 of an almost indefinite extension. While almost all 
 our mission districts have been favored as the scenes 
 of more or less awakening, three have attracted pe- 
 culiar attention. The first and largest is in Mayo 
 and Sligo, the second in Roscommon, and the third 
 in Kerry, in the province of Minister. And nothing 
 can be more interesting to the friends of Ireland 
 than a brief sketch of the plan of operation adopted 
 in these districts. The old missionary system pur- 
 sued in Ireland has long been felt to be beset with 
 difficulties. It has been found that the minds of the 
 adult population are so stereotyped in ignorance and 
 vice, that little can be done to expand or elevate 
 them ; that, besides, they are usually so poor as to 
 need relief, and that this often tempts them to 
 hypocrisy, and exposes us to the charge of bribery ; 
 that the priests, by hindering our converts from get- 
 ting employment, have often forced them to aposta- 
 tize or to emigrate, and thus have sometimes scatter- 
 ed to the winds our fairest missionary fruits ; and, 
 moreover, that the people are usually so degraded as 
 not to see the advantages of a mere literary educa- 
 tion, and so bigoted as to be hostile to a Scriptural 
 one. It was therefore conceived, that our chief at- 
 tention should be turned to the young, while yet 
 their minds were soft and plastic ; especially young 
 
THE TREATMENT EVANGELIZATION. 327 
 
 females, on whom, as the future mothers of the race, 
 its destinies, under God, so much depended ; and 
 that if to the literary and Scriptural element, were 
 added such industrial training as would enable 
 them to earn their own bread, we could multiply our 
 schools to any extent amongst that starving people 
 and not only defy the persecutions of the priest, but 
 obviate the necessity for gratuitous relief, ivith all 
 its evil consequences ; and, finally, that we could 
 thus eradicate the worst habits of the Irish, as idle- 
 ness, begging, Sfc, and implant instead the princi- 
 ples of independence, self-reliance, and self-support. 
 
 Accordingly, in the above districts, nearly 100 
 Scriptural and industrial schools have, within the 
 last six years, been established. About one half of 
 these belong to the " Belfast Ladies' Committee," 
 whose president is Dr. Edgar ; and the remainder 
 are supported by congregations and individuals of 
 various denominations throughout the United King- 
 dom, and superintended by the Rev. Robert Allen, 
 Rev. T. Armstrong, Ballina, Rev. William Chestnut, 
 Tralee, and 12 other missionaries of the Irish Pres- 
 byterian Church. They contain about 5,000 schol- 
 ars in all, some of whom are boys engaged in farm- 
 ing operations, &c. ; but the great majority are girls, 
 employed in knitting, netting, crochet, sewed muslin^ 
 &c. And it is the unanimous testimony of numer- 
 ous friends from England and Scotland, who have 
 visited them, that they are just such an agency as 
 suits'* the present condition of the Irish ; meeting at 
 
328 THJE CURE. 
 
 once their temporal and spiritual wants, and uniting 
 the advantages of the educational, industrial and 
 Spiritual schemes, which we have noticed in a pre- 
 vious chapter. Indeed, the transformation they have 
 already wrought on these creatures is almost incred- 
 ible ; and all that seems necessary to renovate the 
 whole country in 20 years, is to bring its rising 
 generation under their benign influence. Those chil- 
 dren who, some time ago, were in rags, with their 
 faces often swollen from hunger, and their entire 
 condition little better than that of savages, are now 
 earning near £5,000 a-year ! Some of them receive 
 4s. and 5s. a-week ; many are the sole support of 
 their parents and brothers ; and Dr. Edgar's last re- 
 port of the Belfast Ladies' schools in Connaught, 
 entitled, "Woman's Work and Woman's Worth," 
 abounds with instances of the beneficial results of 
 the system. In one of the Kerry schools, superin- 
 tended by the author, three little girls are at present 
 earning more than their father and two brothers, 
 though these are in constant employment ; and the 
 cleanliness, diligence, and general improvement of 
 the scholars, is truly gratifying to behold. But if 
 the reader would see the full effects of this admira- 
 ble system, let him pay a visit to Ballinglen, county 
 Mayo, under the able superintendence of Mr. Allen 
 and Mr. Brannigan. On one side of the romantic 
 glen he will see a large model farm, supported by 
 kind friends in Scotland, on which boys, who were 
 lately running wild through the mountains, are now 
 
THE TREATMENT EVANGELIZATION. 329 
 
 receiving the best Scriptural, literary, and agricul- 
 tural education : on the other side stands a female 
 industrial school, in which girls who, some time ago, 
 were in a state of wretchedness scarce conceivable, 
 are producing the most elegant specimens of embroi- 
 dery, &c. ; in the centre stands a neat new church, 
 weekly filled by a congregation, who. six years since, 
 were degraded Papists, and had never seen a Bible ; 
 the entire district, which was then a scene of utter 
 misery, has undergone the most marvellous transfor- 
 mation : and we are rejoiced to add, that means are 
 now being taken to purchase the whole glen and 
 found therein an extensive Model Industrial Insti- 
 tute for the province.* 
 
 The Requisites. — Such, then, is Ireland's evan- 
 gelistic machinery — sufficient, you would say, for 
 even her conversion. Then what can be the cause 
 that perhaps in no country has the work of grace 
 until recently got on more slowly? We have al- 
 ready given the principal cause. We have had the 
 machinery, but have been deficient in the moving 
 power. And we are firmly persuaded that all that 
 is at present necessary to pentecostal success is sim- 
 ply pentecostal devotedness. The order of heaven 
 
 * There is a <1 eply interesting and successful mission in 
 county Gal way, conducted by Rev. Mr. Dallas, and other 
 ministers of the Established Church ; but as its plan ditfers 
 in nothing from the other missions prosecuted by that church, 
 our brief space hinders us from giving a detailed account 
 of its operations. 
 
330 THE CURE. 
 
 is, " I will bless thee, and make thee a blessing." It 
 is only those that have freely received, who can 
 freely give ; and God has usually honored men ac- 
 cording, not to their gifts, but their graces. But, if 
 ever there was a work which pre-eminently required 
 the Spirit of Christ on the part both of churches 
 and ministers, it is ours. Perhaps there is not be- 
 neath the sun a field of labor in which one is more 
 forcibly taught the utter impotence of human ef- 
 fort, and the special need of divine aid. 'Tis here 
 we are made to feel the whole force of the sublime 
 but humbling sentiment, " Not by might, nor by 
 power, but by my Spirit, saith the Lord." and per- 
 suaded we are that every requisite necessary to secure 
 triumphant success even in it is more deep-toned 
 apostolic piety. What we chiefly want is that un- 
 quenchable spirit of love to Jesus and to souls which 
 glowed in the breast of a Paul and a John. This 
 would give us men ; and constrain our ablest minis- 
 ters, instead of aspiring to the highest places in the 
 church, to envy the missionary his hard lot, and say, 
 u Here am I, send me." This would give us means 
 — then would our people, instead of giving a little 
 from much, give much from a little — then would 
 those drains of selfishness be cut off, but for which 
 the rich could give vast sums, and the poorest could 
 give something — ay, then would be heard from our 
 treasurers the words which once gladdened Moses' 
 ear, " The people give much more than enough for 
 the service of the work." This, too, would inspire 
 
THE TREATMENT EVANGELIZATION. 331 
 
 our churches with that spirit of instant prayer for 
 our missions, which would conduce more to success 
 than all the wealth liberality could bestow. And 
 oh ! how painfully have we missionaries often felt 
 the need of this amid the wild bogs of Connaught 
 and the dreary solitudes of Kerry, shut out from 
 the counsel and intercourse of our brethren in Christ, 
 and obliged to face, single-handed, a thousand diffi- 
 culties ! 
 
 How much more successful we might have been, 
 had we always been sustained by the wrestling pray- 
 ers of the whole church ! And how many an appeal, 
 which only fell on our countrymen's hearts cold and 
 evanescent as snow in the sea, might have kindled in 
 their breasts the spark of heavenly love ! Fellow- 
 Christians ! if Paul needed the church's prayers, 
 how much more do we ! No field of labor more 
 forcibly reminds one of our Lord's striking words, 
 " This kind cometh forth by nothing but by prayer 
 and fasting ;" and now the abundance of our toils 
 and success, instead of tempting you to intermit this 
 great duty, more urgently demands its observance ; 
 for the greater sacrifice laid on the altar, the stronger 
 the fire which is required to consume it. This, too, 
 would inspire that faith so indispensable in a work 
 in which our best schemes have so often failed, and 
 our brightest hopes been blasted — that divine faith 
 which, amid all our disappointments, enables us to 
 endure as seeing Him who is invisible, and recollect 
 that His word cannot return void ; which, even when 
 
332 THE CURE. 
 
 doomed to mourn the apostasy of some over whom 
 we had long travailed, enables us to remember, that 
 though Israel be not gathered, still He will be glo- 
 rified, and thus the grand object secured ; and 
 which, as the ark of our hopes floats restless and un- 
 easy over the moral deluge which now submerges 
 our country, assures us that the waters will in due 
 time subside. Yes, and by faith would we not effect 
 as brilliant achievements as ever ancient saints per- 
 formed ! It is this glorious grace, which, when 
 other principles of benevoleuce are faint and lan- 
 guid, or half-quenched by vexing disappointments, 
 still keeps the heart fixed on Jesus as the author 
 and the end of all we do, and enables us to pursue 
 the same evenly course of humble devotedness, 
 whether we experience success or failure, thanks or 
 ingratitude. Let minor motives rise or fall as they 
 may, beneath the power of this heavenly faith, our 
 grand one remains the same ; and we move on in 
 the path of duty to our Master, like the planets 
 which continue their course round the sun, and 
 scarce feel the disturbance of the thousand stars that 
 surround them. This, moreover, would inspire us 
 with that wisdom so peculiarly needed in a field so 
 arduous. The mismanaged Protestantism of bygone 
 days has left our missionaries a vast inheritance of 
 difficulties. And we have not only to contend with 
 the consequent prejudices of the Papist against the 
 Sassenach, so artfully embittered by an envenomed 
 priesthood, but the proverbial difficulties winch al- 
 
THE TREATMENT EVANGELIZATION. 333 
 
 ways attend the reocciqiation of an old field that has 
 been spoiled in the cultivation, and the evangeliza- 
 tion of a race when the best time for enlightening 
 them has passed away, and the tides of opportunity 
 are at least half-run — a race, moreover, whose singu- 
 lar mental conformation requires so much careful 
 study and skilful treatment. 
 
 Thus might we proceed, at almost any length, 
 and show that every requisite we need is embraced 
 in, or flows from a revival of religion. But our 
 space will only permit us to notice one other grace, 
 which in no country is more required, yet perhaps 
 in none is less practised than in Ireland ; and that 
 is, divine charity. It is a distressing fact, that 
 our missionaries sometimes meet more hindrance 
 from their own brother ministers, than from the 
 Popish priests ; and that there are some amongst us 
 who have not even the Puseyite's plea, but hold the 
 same evangelic views, and profess the same love to 
 Jesus and to souls, who yet act as if they would 
 rather let millions perish than be saved by other 
 hands than their own. We are willing, in part, to 
 excuse them, on the ground of early prejudice. Some 
 of our dear brethren grow up in the belief that tfieirs 
 is tJte church, and all others are schismatics ; that they 
 are the clergy -, and all others are intruders ; and that 
 it were as reasonable to trespass on their farms as 
 their parishes. Their own sections of the church 
 bounds the horizon of their thoughts and affections. 
 To hear them at their public meetings, you would 
 
334 THE CURE. 
 
 think there was neither church nor missions in the 
 world but their own ; and while loudly disclaiming 
 the charge of Posey ism, they either positively con- 
 sign the honored churches of Knox, of Owen, and 
 of Wesley, to God's " uncovenanted mercy," or speak 
 of them as, at Lest, mere excrescences on the " tree 
 of life !" These men have long been a grievous 
 affliction to Ireland. Their conduct has operated 
 as a perpetual blister to their brethren of other 
 churches ; proved the grand hindrance to every 
 catholic movement amongst us ; given priests and 
 Papists reason to laugh amongst themselves ; and 
 done the Saviour's cause immeasurable mischief. 
 And never can we expect the Divine blessing on 
 our common Protestantism till this Protestant 
 Popery is put away from amongst us ; till we get 
 wholly rid of a class of men who smell so strongly 
 of the Romish priest, and whose very look often 
 reminds one of the monastic cell — men who substi- 
 tute crotchets for conscience, bigotry for piety, and 
 ecclesiastical hauteur for the humble spirit of Jesus. 
 We speak thus freely, because we love their church ; 
 we have ever been her warm friend ; and we have, 
 in this volume, proved our regard. We know how 
 severely we will be censured for not giving "the 
 abuses of the Irish Establishment" a place amongst 
 the causes of our country's present darkness. For 
 the sake of brotherly concord, we are willing to bear 
 the blame, and cheerfully make this sacrifice on the 
 great altar of Protestant harmony. For we feel 
 
THE TREATMENT EVANGELIZATION. 335 
 
 that now, when the forces of darkness are combined, 
 and the forces of light are elsewhere combining — 
 when everywhere there is so much danger, and in 
 Ireland so much hope — our great motto ought to 
 be, "Quts separabzt ,•" and that the man who, be his 
 plea what it may, would continue the strife which 
 has too long disgraced Irish Protestants, is, what- 
 ever his profession, the enemy of the cross of Christ. 
 We speak thus plainly, for the sake of our common 
 faith ; for of none has Satan made more use against 
 it than such men, who will not see the difference 
 between co-operation and compromise — who read 
 our Lord's prayer backwards. " That they all may 
 be one" — who " rebuke" and shun all who " follow 
 not with them" — and who, while boasting of theirs 
 as the Catholic Church, act as if bigoted exclusive- 
 ness were its truest mark. 
 
 And now, fellow-Christians, a word ere we close. 
 Are you aware of the dangers that menace you 1 
 The sudden revolutions of 1843 made some think 
 the millennium had dawned unawares ; but we would 
 recommend the portentous change which has since 
 occurred, as a useful study to those who, regardless 
 of all history, are accustomed to despise the efforts 
 of Rome. Her priests may be as stupid as they 
 think them to be ; but is this the character of their 
 Great Adviser ? How often have those acts of Rome, 
 
336 THE CURE. 
 
 which Protestant simplicity has viewed as " blun- 
 ders." turned out to be mere feints! and it much 
 depends, indeed, on Protestants themselves whether 
 the late aggression may not prove one of these. 
 
 The man who knows the prodigious progress Rome 
 has made for the hist fifty years, and the stupendous 
 efforts she is now putting forth and yet would de- 
 spise any move sho makes in her deep and dreadful 
 game, must be given over to strange infatuation. 
 Have we not seen her seizing the chief seats of 
 learning in England, and from thence deluging the 
 land with disguised Popery? Has not her staff of 
 Popish priests in that country increased, during the 
 last 60 years, from scarce 50 till now there are 
 
 EIGHT HUXDRED AND FORTY-EIGHT, with their full 
 
 complement of schools, colleges, convents, and 
 chapels 1* Has not the Popish population of Great 
 Britain, in the same time, grown in proportion ? 
 Has not Popish influence for years virtually con- 
 trolled the legislature, and ruled the empire? Have 
 we not seen Popery, during the last three years, 
 rolling back, by its own single arm. the tides of 
 progress over broad Europe ; shrouding the bright 
 sun of the nineteenth century with a deep eclipse : 
 and causing her creatures of night to creep forth in 
 the gloom, as though it were really the midnight 
 of the twelfth 1 And is it amid such warnings of 
 Providence^ enforced as they are by those of proph- 
 ecy ', that any Christian can sit careless and secure ? 
 
 * Catholic Directory, 1852. 
 
THE TREATMENT EVANGELIZATION. 337 
 
 Is it when a drama of awful grandeur is being 
 enacted around us, when the elements of society are 
 in a fermentation perhaps unparalleled, and when, 
 on a due infusion of the gospel into the seething 
 mass, it must mainly depend whether the issue will 
 be putrefaction or purification, — is it at such a time, 
 fellow-Christians, that any of us shall be found sleep- 
 ing, whose special duty it is to preside over the pro- 
 cess, and direct its course? 
 
 Christians of Great Britain ! you owe our country- 
 man much for your past neglect, and something, too, 
 for his past services. Side by side with his British 
 comrade has he pressed forward in the ranks of death, 
 with that daring courage which is peculiarly his own. 
 And when you have employed him in work less honor- 
 able, has he served you with less fidelity ? Are not 
 those canals and railways which are the monuments 
 of your greatness, memorials, too, of his humble toil ? . 
 Then will you aid in sending him that gospel which 
 has so exalted you, and the lack of which has kept 
 him so degraded? Extend our franchise till every 
 babe has a vote ; drain our country to its mountain 
 tops ; increase your grants till we live on your 
 bounty, — and all must be vain while the poisonous 
 vapors of error and vice are steaming up over the 
 whole land, and blasting every seed of improvement 
 you sow. And think you that you have but little 
 interest in the issue ? See how Irish Popery is per- 
 vading your senate, drenching your country, flooding 
 your colonies, and threatening terrible retribution 
 
 22 
 
338 THE CURE. 
 
 for your past neglect. How few of your large towns 
 have not now an " Irish quarter ?" Are not Irish 
 Papists covering your fair land like locusts? and 
 these, too, the very worst class, who can neither 
 cross the ocean nor exist at home. Are they not 
 at this moment the chief drains on your taxes, con- 
 tributors to your crimes, and corrupters of your 
 moral atmosphere? You have tried every means 
 to get rid of the nuisance, hut in vain. In Liver- 
 pool you established a quarantine, in hope to keep 
 them back : but found that as reasonably did Canute 
 command the waves to retire. From London you 
 sent them home in droves, to return in greater force 
 by the very next tide. Then finding it hopeless to 
 get quit of them, you have next tried to enlighten 
 tliem, and been driven by the stern requirements of 
 self-preservation to establish Irish Toivn Missions 
 . in various cities ; but you have found it utterly im- 
 possible to overtake by any such agency the swarms 
 that are fast gathering around you. 
 
 Yet vast as their influx now is, it threatens daily 
 to increase ; so long as Ireland continues to sink, 
 will they continue to fly from her — and Britain is 
 their nearest asylum. Do you not see new hordes 
 daily encamping amid your civilization, like Be- 
 douins amongst the columns of Palmyra, or Goths 
 amid the gardens of Italy ? And do you not by 
 this time perceive that either you must do some- 
 thing to save Ireland, or she will do much to destroy 
 you ? Once it was a question of mere benevolence 
 
THE TREATMENT EVANGELIZATION. 339 
 
 — it has now assumed a much graver form. If the 
 pauper statistics of Manchester be a fair sample of 
 those of your other large towns, then is the one half 
 of your paupers Irish; and while, since 1846, Eng- 
 lish pauperism has. in that town, increased but 7 per 
 cent,, Irish pauperism has, in the same time, grown 
 above 300 per cent ! ! Yet, what is the mere finan- 
 cial curse to those more deadly moral ones which 
 these wretched beings are inflicting upon you ! 
 Therefore, we repeat, you must for your oivn sakes 
 take up this question as you have never yet done. 
 It is sheer folly to cry, " We are sick of Ireland ;" 
 — if you take not our advice, you will assuredly 
 have cause to be still more sick of her. There 
 stands this great moral marsh by your side; and 
 you have your choice to help us to drain its putrid 
 waters, or take the consequences in the pestilence 
 and death which must follow its poisonous exhala- 
 tions. British fellow-Christians ! we implore you, 
 shake off that security which, amid all those perils, 
 permits your rulers to foster Popery ; ay, and shel- 
 ter those Jesuits whom even Popish countries have 
 expelled. Else the star of Britain's glory, which 
 rose with the Reformation, may have reached its 
 zenith, and be destined ere long to go down. May 
 Grod avert the day ! But should Britain continue 
 to favor the " whore," we are persuaded it is not re- 
 mote ; for never yet did country partake of " her 
 crimes" without also receivii ; of " her plagues." 
 &nd truly mournful it would I if the future histo- 
 
340 THE CURE. 
 
 rian should have to trace to Irish Popery the decline 
 and fall of the greatest empire on which the sun 
 ever shone is the circuit of his glorious way — if he 
 should have to tell how Britain permitted the viper 
 to grow unmolested by her side, and even coming to 
 think its nature changed, began to fondle and caress 
 the dangerous creature, till soon as it found itself 
 strong enough, then true to its venomous instincts, 
 it turned and stung to death the too unsuspecting 
 bosom which had nourished it into vigor by its 
 warmth ! 
 
 Nor is it the inhabitants of Great Britain only 
 who are interested in Ireland's fate — it concerns a 
 large portion of the civilized world — for what has it 
 long been but a nest and nursery of Popery sending 
 forth its annual swarms of wretched beings to infest 
 the remotest regions of the globe ? Along the 
 rivers of America, by the lakes of Canada, on the 
 plains of Australia, you meet them in droves. It is 
 said that 20 years ago there was, in the latter coun- 
 try, but one solitary priest ; and that now, with Van 
 Diemen's Land, it contains 200 priests, 18 bishops, 
 and 1 archbishop! But especially is America con- 
 cerned in this matter. Our deliverance is emphati- 
 cally her danger. To us there is little to dread from 
 the present Popish " exodus," but the risk of its ces- 
 sation ; but what is to us a ground of hope, is to Iwr 
 one of deep solicitude. 
 
 Emigration, which is withering the arm of Popery 
 in Ireland, is strengthening that of Popery in Amer- 
 
THE TREATMENT—EVANGELIZATION. 341 
 
 ica ; and the priests are consoling themselves with 
 the belief that what is lost to them here, is more than 
 gained there — that here their flocks are beggars, but 
 they will there become wealthy citizens — and, above 
 all, that the free institutions of that country will en- 
 large their powers of mischief. Americans, beware ! 
 You are yet confident, but you know not Popery as 
 well as we do, and God grant you never may ! How 
 can you overlook the alarming fact^ that the hordes 
 of Irish Papists who are landing daily amongst you, 
 must needs corrupt your moral atmosphere, and that 
 from the nature of your constitution, your country's 
 only bulwark is the virtue of its people ? Then learn 
 in time from Ireland's ruin what is America's grand 
 danger ! Do you not know that Rome has her 
 deadly eye on your young colossal republic ? That, 
 next to England, you have the largest place in the 
 thoughts and councils of her Propaganda? And, 
 above all, that she cannot endure a republican gov- 
 ernment 7 Has she not in Franco contrived to make 
 the name of a republic a terror to the friends of or- 
 der, and in every Popish land a satire and burlesque 
 on the name % Yet think of the audacity of Hughes, 
 who chooses the hour of Home's most dreadful cru- 
 sade against Europe's freedom, to tell you that she 
 is the parent of liberty and the nurse of republican- 
 ism ! ! ! liberty shrinks at the touch of this mon- 
 ster, and bursts enraged from its embrace as from a 
 ruthless violator. Then, Americans, beware ! The 
 serpent which has so long sought to nestle in the 
 
342 THE CURE. 
 
 mane of the British lion, in hope to sting it to death, 
 is stealthily creeping towards your Eagle's eyrie ; 
 and she that lately closed your chapel in Rome, now 
 clamors the loudest amongst you for the rights of 
 citizenship — the better to enable her to rob you of tliem 
 all ! Long may your banner float side by side with 
 England's flag ! Long may both nations continue 
 together their glorious onward march, dispensing 
 blessings to all mankind, — rivals only in the race of 
 honor and benevolence, and divided by nothing but 
 the ocean that rolls between ! But this, be assured, 
 can only be so long as both shall hold fast those 
 Reformation principles which are the source of all 
 their greatness, and be prepared to defend, if need 
 be, with their blood that divine legacy left to the 
 one by her martyred " worthies," and to the other by 
 her " pilgrim fathers." 
 
 Protestant countrymen ! had we done half our 
 duty, our country had long since been evangelized ; 
 and instead of reaping the bitter fruits of our sin in 
 a polluted atmosphere, a ruinous taxation, and mis- 
 eries manifold, we would now have been blessed in 
 our country's blessedness. But we have lived to 
 witness a gracious revival, and can now point to 
 thousands of as lovely samples of grace in Ireland as 
 may ever be seen on this side glory ; who possess 
 the faith without the fame of martyrs, and will stand 
 very near the throne above, and take rank amongst 
 the highest aristocracy of heaven. To such we now 
 appeal. Beloved friends ! never did the sun of hope 
 
THE TREATMENT EVANGELIZATION. 343 
 
 beam on us more brightly than now. What wonders 
 has God of late wrought amongst us ! How have 
 his recent judgments broken priestly power, disarmed 
 Romish prejudice, hushed the agitator's voice, and 
 turned upon us the eyes of Christendom ! 
 
 The dense clouds of Popery are rising off our 
 land, and the beams of heaven begin to gild her 
 mountains. Our heroic missionaries are bearding 
 the beast in his stronghold ; that gospel, which ele- 
 vates the most degraded, is beginning to take away 
 the Irish Celt's reproach among men, and waking his 
 mind from the sleep of ages ; and those noble germs 
 of Irish character whose growth Popery has for cen- 
 turies hindered, like seeds in the mummy's cold 
 hand, how wonderfully they are now springing to 
 life so soon as touched by the quickening rays of 
 the Sun of Righteousness ! Nor is this all. God 
 has pleased, by means of the famine, to commence 
 a social revolution amongst us, which promises to 
 effect the country's renovation. Irish Popery has 
 ever relied on its numbers — and, to increase these, 
 has encouraged early marriages, and availed itself 
 of the potato's productiveness. But how vain its 
 craftiest devices, when God chooses to mar them ! 
 He smites the potato, and its strength becomes its 
 weakness — its people, who had multiplied like sum- 
 mer insects, vanish like them too — its supplies are 
 cut off — its priests are starving — its chapels are be- 
 ing emptied — and its arm is withered ! And it is a 
 matter of easy enough calculation that, if things go 
 
344 THE CURE. 
 
 on for some years, as, to all appearance, they now 
 must do, Popery in Ireland is inevitably doomed. 
 It would seem as if God had resolved to clear out 
 the country in order to replenish it anew. The 
 land is rapidly passing into British hands. With 
 the emigration of the Irish, there has commenced an 
 immigration of the Scotch and English ; and numbers 
 are only waiting the adjustment of the land question 
 in order to come and settle amongst us. Thus God 
 is renovating the country hj the double process of* 
 driving Popery beyond the ocean, and bringing Prot- 
 estantism from across the channel. We grieve to 
 see our countrymen leaving us ; but who that wishes 
 them well for either world, would bid them stay % 
 By remaining, they starve — perhaps eternally perish 
 — and certainly perpetuate the miseries of their 
 race. By going, they better both themselves and 
 their country ; for they go from bondage to liberty 
 — from hunger to plenty — from horsewhipping priests 
 to where they may read the Bible, and no priest dare 
 frown. Therefore, we say to them — " Go, in the 
 name of the Lord ! If you conduct yourselves 
 well, we shall some day hear of you — and how 
 changed you will be ! Quickened to life by sur- 
 rounding Protestantism you will be seen felling the 
 forests, cutting canals, building railways, rising to 
 comfort, and, best of all, perhaps walking with God. 
 Then go, and the Lord be with you !" Yes, to 
 Ireland there ariseth light in the darkness. Provi- 
 dence Himself is at work — breaking up our present 
 
THE TREATMENT EVANGELIZATION. 345 
 
 wretched social framework to construct out of the 
 ruins a fairer fabric. We cannot arrest the process. 
 nor should we if we could. It is just the self-right- 
 ing laws of the universe at work — God's wisdom 
 and goodness rectifying man's guilt and folly. And 
 it requires, we are persuaded, no seer's eye to behold 
 through the vista of coming years, when this revolu- 
 tion is past, Ireland looking out as from a new crea- 
 tion, like the young vegetation on the moors, that is 
 quickened by the very fires which late have swept 
 over them ! 
 
 Roman Catholic countrymen ! we have been plain 
 with your worst enemy, the best proof of our love to 
 you. You cannot suspect us of any sordid end — for it 
 is too late to enter a field which the most artful dema- 
 gogue has had to quit in despair. Oh ! we come not 
 to strip but to relieve the dying ; and surely the mes- 
 senger of peace may approach unsuspected when 
 even the spoiler is seen to retire. Can you think 
 those priests your true friends, who so uniformly 
 turn your ignorance to their own advantage, and 
 have never benighted where they have not enslaved ? 
 And, will you trust your souls to men with whom 
 you would seldom trust your substance 1 — and re- 
 fuse even to inquire till it is too late to amend ? 
 Then, by that brilliant mind too long enslaved, and 
 that generous heart too long imposed on, exert the 
 birthright God has given you, and judge for your- 
 selves, as you must answer for yourselves. Nor 
 think your priest alone will be accountable if you 
 
346 THE CURE. 
 
 continue to follow him blindfolded to ruin, any more 
 than would your guide alone be the sufferer if you 
 allowed him to lead you over some fatal cliff. And 
 you, their blind guides ! — you must soon meet them 
 at that judgment-seat, where your very best apology 
 shall be, — " We did it ignorantly in unbelief." If 
 we admit your honesty, it must be by denying your 
 intelligence — fearful alternative this, between igno 
 ranee and imposture ! 0, behold the fruits of your 
 dreadful diligence in the wreck of the finest people 
 the great Creator ever formed ! And think you, 
 shall that mockery of justice, which so often sullies 
 our earthly tribunals, that punishes them, and pen- 
 sions you, tarnish the purity of the Great White 
 Throne ? No, he who robs men of the key of knowl- 
 edge, shall there at least be held accountable for all 
 the consequences : that ignorance which will be their 
 palliation, shall constitute the main count in your in- 
 dictment ; and whatever punishment may on this 
 ground be deducted from their sentences, must neces- 
 sarily be added to yours. And are you prepared for 
 a reckoning so awful ? If not, even for you there is 
 hope — and this is the crowning proof of God's bound- 
 less love. The grace which arrested Saul of Tarsus, 
 was designed as encouragement in cases so desperate ; 
 and that miracle of grace may again be performed, 
 which made c: a great company of the priests obe- 
 dient to the faith." 
 
 THE END. 
 
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