The Sun.
London, England, 1828-05-09 00:00:00

some details, and to read some diseuments, the value and
importance of which could alone supply any adequate apo-
logy for the trespass he was committing on the time of the
House—knowing, as he did know, how reluctant the
House usually were to listen to statements and documents
of this nature. (Hear.) The Mr. Cooke of whom he
had been speaking was, at the time this pamphlet was
published, Under Secretary of State for the Civil Depart-
ment in Ireland ; a man of very considerable talents, and
in principle, although favourable to the Union, warmly
opposed to the question of Catholic Emancipation. Yet
here was his own declaration to that effect—" that the
language which was held at that time by Mr. Pitt in Eng-
land, and Lord Castlereagh in Ireland, was, that it was
necessary to hold out to the Sectaries of Ireland the pro-
spect and consideration of the advantages which they
would be likely to realise from carrying the Union in que.:,
tion into effect,"—that, however hopeless, their case before
the Union must be undoubtedly considered, there must re-
sult from its accomplishment all those future substantial
benefits to them, of which Mr. Cooke then proceeded to
where the measure was most ear-
speak. In one paragraph,
nestly recommended, the writer. .expressly mid, addressing
himself precisely to the great community which was not of the
Established Church, " An opening may be left in any plan
of Union, far the Suture admission of the Roman Catholics
to a participation. of all the rights and privileges enjoyed
by their Protestant fellow-subjects." At that time every
other privilege but that of the exercise of the elective fran-
chise had been already granted to the Roman Catholics, so
that the allusion was clearly to the exception just noticed.
His (Mr. Fitzgerald's) Hon. Friend had quoted a passage
from a speech of Mr. Pitt's ; but he (Mr. Fitzgerald)
could show, if it were necessary for him to do so, the per-
fect concurrence of all the members of that Government
and the friends of Mr. Pitt, not less than of Mr. Pitt him-
self, on the great question of admitting the Roman Ca-
tholics. He could show, from similar papers and letters,
this concurrence in all the 'Ministers of that time—Mr.
Pitt, Mr. Dundas, and others in the English House of
Commons, and Lord Grenville; and in the House of Lords,
Lord Minto. They all agreed in declaring that, as long
as Ireland existed as a separate Government, it was in
vain to hope for a remedy for the afflictions it entailed upon
her people; but that her people, in the event of an union's
taking place with England, they might look forward, with
full confidence to the removal of them.—The Right Hon.
Gentleman, in confirmation of his statement, here read the.
following extract from a speech delivered by the late Lord
Castlereagh, in the Irish Parliament :
" The Protestant, so long as the Establishment re-
mains separate, and is impeached on local grounds, will
feel his power, his property, and his Establishment inse-
cure, and must naturally look with distrust and jealousy
on the Catholic. The Catholic will feel proportionate
alienation and resentment, and will continually urge his
claims against the establishment of the minority; and
there appears no hope whatever of a termination of dis-
trust, jealousy, anti alarm. But so soon as the Church
Establishment of the two kingdoms shall be incorporated
into one Church, the Protestant will feel himself at once
identified with the population and property of the empire,
and the Establishment will be placed upon its natural basis.
The cause of distrust must vanish with the removal of
weakness ; strength and confidence will produce libera-
lity ; and the claims of the Catholics may be temperately
discussed and impartially decided before an Imperial Par-
liament, divested of those local circumstances which pro •
duce irritation and jealousy, and prevent a fair and reason-
able decision."

It was a curious fact, that when Mr. Cooke published
his pamphlet, so decidedly was this pledge considered to be
given in it, on his part, as an organ of the Irish Govern-
ment, that Doctor Duigenan, at once imputed to him, all
his zeal, opposed as he was to the Catholics, in favour of
the Union, to a deeply laid and insidious scheme for the
subversion of the Protestant Establishment.—(Hear, bear, )
But the language of Mr. Dundas, at the same period, both
in and out of Parliament, was still more decisive and ex-
plicit; and the House would he pleased to observe, that the
pamphlet from which he (Mr. Fitzgerald) was now read-
ing, and other documents on the same matter, were printed
expressly and avowedly for circulation among the Members
of the Irish Government, Legislature, and Aristocracy, with
the design of propitiating them to the. They were
all of them printed moreover at the public expense.—
(Hear, hear.) The expressions of Loid pinto were equally
strong and clear to the fact, of this concession of the claims
of the Catholics being held nut as the certain result of ac-
complishing that Union. It was perfectly notorious that
all these papers and speeches, especially Mr. Pitt's speech
in favour of the Union and of this among its other
anticipated effects, were distributed and disseminated
among the officers commanding districts, and gene-
rally among the most influential people in Ireland.—
Now, if all this did not amount, in the English Govern-
ment, to as strong and. express a pledge to give the Roman
Catholics emancipation from civil and political disabilities,
he owned he was at a less to understand what meaning was
to be attributed to particular words. He had taken the
liberty, on the present occasion, of making himself a witness
before the House, because, having supported the Union,
he never could forgive himself if he were now to refrain
from apprising Parliament that it was the avowed and ac-
knowledged intention of the Government of that day (an in-
tention never concealed or disguised from him), that the
Union was to be immediately followed by the emancipation
of the Roman Catholic:.—(Loud cheers.)—True it was
that, upon one occasion, Mr. Fox had incidentally said that
he did not understand any pledge to have been given by Mr.
Pitt, pending the existence of the Irish Legislature, which
was binding on the English Parliament. But of course
Mr. Pitt could not give his answer to the representations of
the great Catholic body in such a way as to pledge the Par-
liament of England to any measure, which was then one for
the cognizance and consideration of the Irish Legislature.
And to show how indisposed the great body of the latter
were to a question which this Government was then push-
ing so earnestly upon it, be would state that he
well remembered, in one instance, to have been one of
a minority of fifteen upon the question, out of the
three hundred Members of whom that Legislature con-
sisted. But he might further appeal to Mr. Pitt's own
letters to the Catholic community of Ireland, for conclu-
sive and irresistible evidence of this understanding and
wishes open the subject; and after all this, part of the
question turned upon the consideration of a simple point,
namely—what was the intention of the Union ? Every
man of honour and public principle would admit to him,
he was sure, that if the members of the Catholic body had
been induced to support the Union by the prospect of cer-
tain advantages which had been held out and promised to
them as the condition of their acquiescence in that arrange-
ment, nothing could be so base as to leave them in the
lurch, after that arrangement had been 50 carried into exe-
cution.—(Hear.)—He proposed, in the next place, to read
a letter to the House, which he had received from a Ro-
man Catholic gentleman, on the subject of Lord Corn-
wallis's wishes and intentions in respect of the Union.
That letter (which he had been authorised by the writer
so to communicate) had come from a gentleman whom he
would name, and than whom, when he named him, every
body who had the pleasure of his acquaintance would al-
low that no purer, or more honourable, or unimpeachable
testimony, could he adduced, he meant Mr. Howard, of
Corby.—(Hear.)
The letter was as follows -
" 'Whatever was at first the subject of conversation, it
soon turned to the impending measure of union, and with
me generally to the interests the Catholics would derive
odious monopoly,
from it. lie always called the exclusion of Catholics the
and repeatedly urged, that the measure
was the only means of getting rid of it. But he further,
particularly on
Catholics Itwo occasions, desired me to speak to all the
knew, and which I did, to urge them to place
confidence in him for success. if they will only place their
trust in me, it will be to their .best advantage. 01 eaurse
I repeated this to every Catholic I knew, and amen.- the
rest to Lord Fingal], who will remember it, and to whom
he bad said this and snore. I reollect also, that Dr. Moy-
Cornwallis had spoken to him to the
lan told me, that Lord
same effect. Ido not believe that Lord Cornwallis way'
capable of deception ; and
inferred then, as I must now,
that this had been assented to by both the King and the
Cabinet (and though this did not amount to an absolute
pledge, in words, yet, from a Gentleman, and a Chief
Governor, it could not be interpreted otherwise). - I can-
not attribute the failure in any other way than to the sub-
sequent
Fitzgeraldtsta in the nex
teofthei(ingmt ind"
3place read from notes which
Mr. Howard had minuted down, several of these convex. -
happened or on the succeeding mornings ; the
sations with Lord Cornwallis, either on the same evenings
ft
()hilt.
wtilni egy
is an extract :
"Speaking of the inflamed state of the mind between
sect and sect, I said that I thought it was owing to him
that it had not come to the full extent of mutual extermi-
nation, which I conceived had been daily gaining ground.
This Lord C. said, must have been the event. I trusted,
however, that with respect to the Catholics, as it ap-
peared to be the interest to conciliate them, that would be
an object of the Union, and that without it, I thought the
Union was nothing. He repeated that certainly without it
the Union was nothing ; that it was, impossible to bring
anything forward before, because in an Irish Parliament it
would not be carried. I said that, however, the silence
and mystery created both uneasiness and impatience. He
answered, that he believed it to be so, but that he thought
the Catholics had shown a great deal of temper, more than
he could have expected, by some joiuing for it, none ap-