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

2-/*.t d/

INIPERIAL PARLIAMENT.

HOUSE OF COMMONS, MAY S.

CATHOLIC QUESTION.
Lori JOHN RUSSELL presented a petition from the
in,_archants and others of Bristol in favour of the Catholic
cLauttas Retook that opportunity of asking the Right Hon.
'''''kt• opposite (Mr. I:terriers) whether the Royal - Assent
• eras to he given to a Bill which had passed in both Houses
for the repeal of the Test and Corporation Acts.
" _slrs MERRIES said that he could give no answer to
le Noble Lord.
Sir FRANCIS BURDETT—Sir, before I proceed to
ent—r°4l)k the House with any observations, I shall beg leave
saY a few words respecting the postponement of my
been
from a former day, and which I understand has
j'aen Productive of inconvenience to many Hon. Members.
Sir, I assure those Honourable Gentlemen that it must
als„Ways be matter of great regret to me to run the
augatest risk of putting them to any inconvenience, but I
shall not now trespass unnecessarily upon the time
°the House by pointing out those reasons which influenced
rla,,,Y conduct, and which I abstained from s•. •g- •
Bones when called upon by a Noble Lord on a former
the
reasons which must be obvious to
4e House, and among them I shall mention
c'a
,4e, namely, that I did not then think it fair towards the
`lncoinistration of the Country, to bring forward the
'Action at that time. But as that has nothing to do
With the subject, I merely mean to express my regret
that postponement has put Hon. Members to any material
alconaenience, and shall then proceed to state the grounds
l'Pon which I mean to call upon the House to accede to the
motion which I intend to make. In doing so, however, I
wt help feeling the very great difficulty in which
.444: stand, a difficulty greater than I have ever expe-
''aileed on any former occasion, open many accounts, and
. Particular/as on account of the subtraetion of those great
~,a4(l'l3lenditi talents, the benefit of which I was accustomed
"' have in support of the prayer of the petitioners,—
!)a,' that defalcation occasioned, first hy the removal by
th of the Right Hon. Gentleman who held the prin-
-44 situation in his Majesty's Councils, and of a Learned
and Hon. Gentleman who has been removed to another
glee.
I must feel that without the assistance of those ta-
lents which were so conversant with the question, and
Which were exercised in advocating it, I am placed under
disasl vantsges of a peculiar nature. With respect to the
istarasel Gentleman, he has been only removed to another
Place, where I hope that this question will still receive the
t"' less beneficial support of his talents, and where
-Y will be exercised as much to the advantage of the
Petitioners, as they ever were in this House. With respect
!to the other Right Hon. Gentleman (Mr. Canning) it is mat-
"• tome of unmitigated sorrow and regret, that by his loss I
have been deprived of the assistance of one who advocated
t
}a question as I do—as the advocate of religion. Ido
(„,"PIY regret the loss of that Right Hon. Gentleman.
1",. ear, hear.) In stating this, Sir, I have some cones).-
alt? °, that though politically opposed to Mr. Canning
frutg tile greater part of my life time—though opposed
Cequently to him upon topics of great interest and which
at ",e likely to excite warns feelings, it is to me a satisfaction
se4' moment that our political hostility was never debased
a feeling of private enmity,—(Hear, hear),—that it was
,evise degraded by any envy of his talents, and that as far
ra, .aPPeared to my understanding, I did justice to his
sienna tite and paid always to his talents the homage of that
It
which they were calculated to exite.—(Hear. )_.
tottlat also, Sir, be a consolation to those who are dearest
4 aat Right Hon. Gentleman, however deeply we may
4e his loss—a loss not only to this country but to the
£eL civilized world, which was deprived of the influence
a* 'La great attainments at a moment when that
el-se Was most severely felt, and therefore the most
s!
!act:Y. to be deplored ;—it must, I repeat, be a conso-
la, tt to those nearest and dearest to him, that there was
tai,:li,oent at which he could have been taken from this
hti with more advantage to his own fame and repu-
41,°a, seeing that there was no mosnent when he could
,44,. e left behind him a name more connected with asso-
Ci°ll,ll anal expectations which produced regret through-
ta° a the civilized world. To Min may be applied
t" Worsts of the great Roman to his father-in-law—nTu
sarLfeliz Agricola, non vitav tantum claritate sed etiam
, ukii ta te mortis." Had the Right Honourable
ea,:etrian lived a thousand years, he could not have
kip a moment to retreat from the stage of
kinn"'t life with greater eclat than the moment when his
4'7, had arrived at the utmost, when it could not by poss-
-7,!Y be put out of the reach of fortune in time to come.
s,,Pear, hear.)—ln bringing forward this question, I am
Dl4tated by the same spirit and feeling which actuated that
,"4"ght Hon. Gent., and I shall propose at the end of my ad-
ettt'ss, a resolution which having been enforced by him in
si,:4l* times and sanctioned by a large majority of this
st, llae, entitles me to call upon the House to adopt it for
t:bseahe of its own consistency, and not at this time
Of tiv behind hand in liberal feeling with the rest
C 4 sibt7ea Civilized world, which is advancing in a career
attioap. ItY and justice, that it is our duty to be
to te the, first to adopt. Sir, Mr. Canning was attached
the e,tstablished Church of the country as I am—
as,,tioNcit in which he brought forward the Catholic
but tit: Was a spirit not of hostility to that Church,
hi the Mane spirit in which I now bring it forward,
anel 'a spirit of a friend to the Established Church
With •
441,1 i a view not to weaken. but to strengthen that
ktiti..."hulent, and to place it ~upon grounds which must
ikte,rYond the reach of all assailants. I may say there-
" y;, that Right Hon. Gentleman, "though he be dead,
tile h.4l' *Peaketli," and I shall here endeavour to speak in
uita,c feelings and sentiments, and with reference to the
IN ate views and objects of that Right Hen. Gentle-
Lei; I trust that I shall be considered as standing
CAN not with any feelings of hostility to the Established
aua,Liq,, but as one of in, members; and as a man per-
aael;;OPon reason and principle that it is the best Church,
'ir, ,",e :ch, if I had a choice, I should be inclined to adopt.
,taer),l'm opinion I have upon this subject is one arising not
'agliy he
of public grounds, but also from private feel-
41,as a It has been my lot to find some of my earliest and
'A 1,,,val ed friends among the Ministers of the Established
t'aatltsc,"4, :Land now that I have touched upon this topic, I
'ietd-Zefuse myself the satisfaction of boasting of my
illetasTP with a distinguished ornament of the Establish-
Nis,-an individual, who, however he may be hid in
aderZpt, can never be concealed in obscurity--a man
'tad ,s 4 With the greatest talent and the highest virtues-
4id :ter Was strong ability and deep learning, accompa-
Ittis,j More perfect candour and sincerity in the investi-
-I°Wll,Ol truth, than in the case of the esteemed person
~';'ftly-',4 I have alluded, and whom I shall now take the
f.\'-..1 `0 Hams—his name being indeed his best panegy-
,-114414an Dr. South, the head of Magdalen College,
,i,4"ns,a• I know not, Sir, whether my mention of his
Tistisa7.this public manner may not be offensive to this
0.:,i:4;',,'4. ed and public
ornament of his sacred pro..
sc)u.sit at the same time, I seized the opportunity of
• 4 sq, in Order to evince that I am far from standing
'''Llitua aa4ocate the claims of the Catholics, under the
eaC-14'11(% ,of a. hostile feeling towards the Established
t„)aktat.,'_ out, on the contrary, to prove that, on every ac-
f 'la 17, 4 grounds private as well as public—l am anxious.ad
a(ie,INC"Y thing in my power to strengthen instead
D,:voll ,P 1 the Establishment. Sir, I think that by ens
"i"."4l%°g to promote the success of Catholic Emanci-
-4,,%11141atti taking the best course to secure the safety
aa", ta,"tch and State. Sir, what I shall endeavour to
i,„t --' las- 41 this House, as the case of the petititioners, will
,:at r'n different grounds; all and either of which, if
ec,--4tist to the satisfaction of this House, must be
ties in their favour. First of all, lam anxious
/ N hont to the conviction of this House, the kiss
evilits;tl, ancient Treaty, the departure from which
I te "IP looking upon as the origin of all the
cose atea , . a.
te, Id , , which the Catholics labour at this day.b—
taiLl the tilts Treaty of Limerick as the Bill of Rights es
tlerisa7 '4)Plan Catholics of Ireland and the people of
that ;' ci'-b`''e4e, hear)—and since the Right Hon. Gen-
t
h-bit ;},rca'ie (Mr. Peel) has given us to understand,
Rocer'aes-at haa been done had violated the rights of
Tt.tattlis ius,.tholics, he would be inclined now to make
til,,4eY 1 "'lt faith, and to give us the advantage of that
Plar4) ilah, 411 the snore anxious to convince him that
and at'aNtle: have been grossly violated. This the Right
Rive -mkt-
that if a violation could be shewn he would
'to Ihthis '
:advantage of his vote on that occasion.
caat'% -',.!i'li Itvadl maks, it necessary for me to endeavour
,lie bar
~+4t • • and a can show, as I think
~t 1,41, q 011 Proposition ; arii i 4
With Oith that is now asked for by the petitioners at
1
Ball ()if, this House was granted to them by the public
fotave aaNtntry in the Treaty of Limerick, I trust
.I
It: tO ti 41e enough to induce every Member in this
1,4 beta ~Y, tllat the prayer they ask should be granted.
ea,, . 0 tll,.
~j,\ -.°) to ' first proposition, then comes another not
1411-I,eta. r4alae out—the Treaty of Union—(hear,
e ',...''' ve„"n this country and Ireland, where solemn
sTPIe of ,Riven by the people of this country to
, 5,Ve; t /reland, and where, had those pledges not
!,,,ouldi''' measure that was then carried into even-
*";lind ,c4t have been adopted—(Hear, hear,
114,71,tea, 'a that measure which was proposed had not
, .r3ting iti'n,'' if an independent Parliament had been
14...4 tilts, itilat Country, I would put it to any Gentle-
e p"'eteintitoeriae,rBl4otise to say, whether that independent
this day have repudiated the petition of
What Was a--Ilear.)---Sir I shall g on to show
Theo-(
t
- aaeed it was, becoming o inus to grant ;

and if it was becoming to grant—if it had not been resting
on common sense and sound justice it would still have
to he considered as standing on the strong grounds of
private faith and public security._(Hear.)—With respect
to the first part of this question, I have said, Sir,
that it will be necessary for me to refer to the Treaty
of Limerick, but before I do that, I will take
the trouble of reading to the Right Hon. Gentleman, a
-atatement—he himself made in 1827. On that occasion
he said—" I think it necessary for me to state, that I shall
not shrink from what I said in the year 1825, and that if
I could be satisfied that any of the advantages secured to
the Roman Catholics of Ireland by the treaty of Limerick
had been violated that would alter my vote ; but I feel
that nothing has, been done to afford any ground for
having their disabilities removed." Now, Sir, lam
at issue with the Right Hon. Gentleman on this point,
and would that this had been argued by a more com-
petent individual, and in a more satisfactory manner,
and I should have perfect confidence in the result. I
will now refer to the first article in the Treaty, which
is a 9 follows :
" 1. The Roman Catholics of this Kingdom shall en-
joy such privileges in the exercise of their religion as are
consistent with the laws of Ireland, or as they did enjoy
in the reign of Charles the Second ; and their Majesties,
as soon as their affairs will permit them to summon a Par-
liament in this kingcthm, will endeavour to procure the
said Roman Catholics such further security, in that parti-
cular, as may preserve them from any disturbances upon
the account of their said religion."
Now, Sir, in relation to this article, I have to observe,
and I do so plainly, and without any nicety or refinement
of special pleading, that there are evidently two distinct
members or parts .in it ; the first relating to the present
free exercise of the religious rights claimed by the Roman
Catholics ; the second containing a promise of "further
security in that particular," in order to preserve the parties
"from any disturbances upon account of their religion."
Now, Sir, I ask any candid and impartial man whether it
is no "disturbance upon account of religion "to make
your enjoyment of political rights and civil privileges de-
pend upon the abandonment of your religious faith ?
(Hear, hear.) I ask whether there is no disturbance
on account of religion in making religion itself the cause
and means of disturbance and annoyance, and compelling
individuals either to abandon their religious faith, or give
up the enjoyment of their rights and privileges—thus (in
the latter case) sacrificing their temporal advantage to their
sense of moral rectitude : or (in the former) surrendering
their consciences to their desire of secular profit. This,
Sir, is the situation of the Roman Catholics of Ireland ;
and I am prepared to assert, that it is impossible to con-
ceive a situation more distressing for any parties to be ob-
liged to occupy, or more unjust for one set of human beings
to compel another to stand in. Sir, it is most cruel, unjust,
and oppressive, to place persons in a situation in which the
exercise and enjoyment of political rights and privileges de-
pend upon a compromise between the conscience and self-
interest, so that the suffering parties are forced to abandon
either their religion or their liberty. This, I contend, is
in direct violation of that stipulation contained in the
Treaty of Limerick, that the Roman Catholics " shall not
he disturbed on account of their religion !" What is it but
disturbing them on account of their religion, when their
civil and political rights are, on that ground, and on that
ground only, withheld ! The Treaty goes on, in the se-
cond article (by the way, I may here observe that the
Right Hon. Gentleman, on a former occasion, argued that
the compact related only to private rights and privileges,
the enjoyment of which it guaranteed.) The Treaty Pro-
ceeds, in the second article, distinctly to recognize and
guarantee the continuance of the public rights of the Ro-
man Catholics, as they existed in the 'time of Charles the
Second. However, before discussing more minutely the
terms of this article, I may as well mention that the Right
Hon. Gentleman stated, in the first instance, that the
Treaty applied to the garrison of Limerick only, but after-
wards he corrected himself, and allowed that it had a more
extensive application. But to come to the second article,
it is one which I consider extremely material ; after stating
that all parties included within the provisions of the Treaty
who shall " return and submit to their Majesties' obe-
dience, shall hold, possess, and enjoy, all their estates of
freehold and inheritance." After thus promising protec-
tion to their properties and private rights, it goes on to
guarantee them the enjoyment of "all the rights, titles, and
interests, privileges, and immunities,which they and every or
any of them held, enjoyed, or were rightfully and lawfully
entitled to, in the reign of King Charles the Second, or at
any time since, by the laws and statutes that were in force
iu the said reign of King Charles the Second." Now,
Sir, I ask, what can be more distinct or decisive than
this? For my part, Ido not see how it is possible for
words more expressly or directly to stipulate for the en-
joymen, of all rights, public as well as private, by the
parties to the treaty, " and their heirs," for these latter
words are introduced in the earlier part of the clause.
It cannot be said that, because the clause guarantees the
full and peaceable enjoyment of private rights, it does
not therefore comprehend public privileges, where the
latter are expressly guaranteed. In fact, the second
article stipulates for, sad extends to the unrestrained ex.

individuals, the matter would not have been surprising, nor
the argument to be deduced from the circumstance con-
clusive in any way. What, I ask, was so natural as that
the great man and eminent lawyer whose name has been
mentioned, should in those hazardous and dreadful times,
advocate the cause of his clients without reference to the
circumstances, and with all the habitual skill and pru-
dence of a professor of the law, take care, as the phrase
is, not to travel out of the four corners of his brief. Sir,
though the argument of Sir Toby Butler had related
solely and exclusively to the private wrong and injury
sustained by his clients, yet that circumstance would
not have been conclusive, nor could it be taken as
proving that public, as well as private injury, had
not been inflicted by means of the infraction of the Treaty
of Limerick. If Sir Toby Butler had contented himself
(as perhaps he might) with arguing the immediate question
then under the consideration of Parliament--namely the
question of a private injury—it would not have afforded
conclusive evidence or even fair presumption !that public,
as well as private interests, were not involved in the non-
performance of the condition, of the solemn compact enter-
ed into between this country and the Irish Roman Catho-
lics at Limerick. But how dots the case stand.? Sir
Toby Butler took the opportunity afforded him by a case
of private damage, boldly to allude to one of public mis-
chief. He took the opportunity of his appearance before
the bar of the House on hehelf of individuals, to plead the
cause of the nation. He appealed--most indisputably ap-
pealed—to Parliament on the subject of the wrongs inflict-
ed on the public by the infraction of the Treaty of Lime-
rick. With equal ability and public spirit, he asserted
and vindicated the integrity of the treaty, at die same time
that Le denounced its violation. Sir, I will take the
liberty to quote some of the principal points of Sir Toby
Butler's argument upon this occasion. First, then, after
urging the cruel infringement upon private rights in con-
sequence of the breach of the treaty in the particular case
in question, he proceeds to argue, that by the compact en-
tered into at Limerick, the Roman Catholics were resto-
red to all the privileges to which:they were entitled equally,
with all other classes of their fellow-subjects ; that such
privileges were recognized by the laws of all nations, except
in cases of particular forfeiture—that the Roman Catho-
lics of the Kingdom of Ireland had been guaranteed the
enjoyment of all privileges which they possessed in the
reign of Charles IL and that no law could deprive them
of their birthright thus recognized, and to which they
were entitled, equally with all other of his Majesty's sub-
jects. He then complained that the Roman Catholics by
certain articles in a Bill before alluded to, were prohibited
from a number of things, the deprivation of which was
neither more nor less than a gross infringement upon pub-
lic liberty and equal justice—that for instance they were
prohibited from visiting or residing in certain towns and
places, without first finding such securities as were not
required, nor could legally he demanded, by the law of the
realm, as it had heretofore existed. Further, he com-
plained that the Roman Catholics were prohibited from
voting for Members of Parliament, without taking certain
oaths and declarations contrary to Article 7 of the Treaty of
Limerick.—(Hear, hear.)—He also denounced the prac-
tice of taking away the right of advowsons and presenta-
tions from Roman Catholics; in fact, the system of de-
priving them of their property in this respect, except they'
abjured their religion, contrary to the express provi-
sions and declarations contained in Magna Charta.—
From all this it appears, the Right Honourable Gentle-
man is mistaken, when he imagines that Sir Toby Butler
did not argue, against the breach of the Treaty of Lime-
rick, in a public as well as in a private point of view. Sir,
there is another remarkable thing in the able anti public-
spirited speech of this celebrated lawyer. Sir Toby But-
ler, as is known to all persons, was an individual who
held a high and important station in the country, and de-
voted his great abilities to the service of his countrymen.
From his sentiments, those of the public mind iu his time
may be collected ; and his speech affords an evidence of ge-
nerosity of feeling that perhaps may surprise Hon. Gentle-
men, at least such of them as have been in the habit of
forming their notions and opinions of the Roman Catho-
lics from the misrepresentations, calumnies, and falsehoods
studiously put forward by their enemies.—(Cheers.)—Sir,
it is only the other day that a most invidions, ironical, and
satirical remark was made in relation to the feeling recently
evinced by the Roman Catholics with regard to their Pro-
testant brethren the Dissenters ; and it was invidiously and
bitterly observed, that the papers were nosy pretending a
fellow-feeling on behalf of the Protestants, with a view to
their own ultimate advantage. Sir, it is a singular cir-
cumstance, that so far from any thing like this being the
cause, I say it is a singular circumstance, and one every
way deserving allusion, that the more we look at the sub-
ject, and examine fairly into the character and conduct of
our Roman Catholic brethren, the more pure and disinte-
rested do their proceedings appear. If we investigate the
subject dispassionately, without giving way to unjust and
unfounded prejudices. When we look to the facts of the
case, we find in every new examination of them something
to raise the Roman Catholics in the estimation of every
honest man, and do away with the groundless calumnies and
gross misrepresentations of which they have been made the
subjects. On this occasion, Sir—l allude to the opinion
of Sir T. Butler, before the Irish Parliament—we find a
singular, but pertinent and satisfactory answer to the ap-
parently smart, though really ignorant remark to which I
have adverted—l mean the remark as to the pretended cor-
diality, but actual perfidy evinced by the Roman (7atholics
towards the Dissenters. Here, Sir, in the course and
progress of this very cause before the Irish Parliament,
when Sir T. Butler might have been only expected to exert
himself against the oppression, cruelty, and injustice under
which his Roman Catholic fellow-countrymen laboured—
an oppression the more detestable because exercised under
the form and semblance of law. At this very time, and
on this occasion, while his friends and clients were smart-
ing under the acts of some of those persons, whose cause he
yet undertakes to advocate, lie speaks thus of the Dissent-
ing Protestants of Ireland. He says, whatever the Irish
Papists may be thought to meditate against the safety of the
State, surely the Protestant Dissenters have not done any
thing to render themselves liable to the same injustice
with which their Roman Catholic brethren are visited, or
to give just cause and ground for their being worse treated
in any particular than other Protestants. On the contrary,
he 'proceeded to argue, if these Dissenters whom ye now
oppress had not, by their timely interference, stopped the
Irish army at Londonderry, the settlement of this country
might not have been so easily accoinplished ; for, continues
he, if that army had gotten to Scotland at a time when
they had boats, barks, and all things ready thereto, and
frieruis awaiting them bearing arms, it was easy to see the
consequences thereof to the kingdom. But the, Dissenters
were then entrusted with commissions civil and military,
and the event was prevented. After all this (adds Sir
T. Butler), to pass a Bill now to deprive the Dissenters of
their birth-right for the good services they have done, is
a most unkind return; for, surely, whatever the Papists
may deserve, the Peotestant Dissenters are clear of all
blame, and if this be all the return they are to receive for
their good intents and actions, it will afford slender en-
couragement to others hereafter to pursue their example.
Such are the sentiments expressed by Sir Toby Butler on
this occasion in relation to the Protestant Dissenters of his
time. I think, after this, it is hardly necessary to say that
malignant feelings are not entertained by the Irish Catholics
against any individuals on account of their religion. Sir,
this is no new or extraordinary case of splendid and elevated
generosity on the part of the Roman Catholics, but merely
one most slighted and brilliant instance of that disinterested
and generous quality so frequently evinced by' the Catholics
of Ireland—that feeling of generosity under the influence
liberality- passions
as have r
contra-
distinguished n bterea!
a o
sense of and
of which it is consistent with the Irish character to for-
get injuries—to bury in oblivion animosities. When
once all the m
overspread by justicese selfish
and
distinguished from every other conflicting motive, and
re evil
every inferior feeling. Not only in such cases do they
withhold all expression of asperity and bitterness at in-
juries being endured, and wantonly inflicted, but all the
powers of their hearts and minds become absorbed in one
generous feeling of indignation at the wrongs and suffer-
ings of men who have been their bitterest, most decided,
and most uncompromising enemies. Sir, I trust, the
Right Hon. Gentleman will allosv, that the articles agreed
upon in the Treaty of Limerick do not stipulate only for
private rights, independently, of public privileges. In my
opinion, the attempt formerly made by the Honourable
Gentleman to prove the correctness of his construction
of the treaty in this respect, has not been successful,
backed and supported as it was by a reference to
a letter written on the subject by King William the Third.
Sir, the interpretation which I put upon this treaty—this
Treaty of Limerick—is the same which was put upon it
by Bishop Burnet, the great historian of that time. Sir,
ilishop Burnet distinctly states, that by the stipulations of

ercise, both of political and private immunities by the
Roman Catholics, as they enjoyed them in the reign of
Charltrs 11. Sir, the question is—but I correct myself,
for as it appears to me, there can be no doubt, and,
therefore, nu question on the subject—the inquiry then
resolves itself into this—what rights and privileges did the
Roman Catholics enjoy in the time of Charles 11. That
is the only point for consideration. I believe lam fully
justified in stating, that at the time referred to, the
Roman Catholics possessed and enjoyed all the rights,
privileges, and immunities, which fell to the lot of their
fellow-subjects. Sir, all such civil and political rights
as they possessed at that period, they were entitled to
under the provisions of the Treaty of Limerick ; and if they
are now excluded from any part of those privileges, they are
excluded in direct violation of the stipulations of that treaty.
Sir, another part of the treaty is not a little remarkable—
it shows that there existed in the minds of the Roman Ca-
tholics of the time not a feeling or presentiment of the
" disturbance" to which they were likely to be exposed on
" account of their religion," but also a prophetic feeling of
the mode in which they were to be so disturbed. The
9th article expressly stipulates that the oath to be adminis-
tered to the Roman Catholics shall be the oath of allegiance,
" and no other." I will read the words of the article to
the House :

" 9. The oath to be administered to such Roman Catho-
lics as submit to their Majesties' Government, shall be the
oath above said, and no other."
Sir, from the clause of the treaty, I should be almost
disposed to infer that the Roman Catholics had the wisdom
and foresight, or feeling and presentiment (call it what you
will), to perceive the means by which they were likely to
be disturbed in the exercise of their religion and enjoy-
ment of their civil privileges, and accordingly provided
against the event of a special article. Sir, unhappily their
fears, if they entertained them, were but too well verified;
they were verified to the utmost extent by the penal en-
actment of the code. I trust there is no man now living
who is prepared to justify the laws passed against the
reign
of Mr. Burke when he pro-
flounced them nn
Of Queen Anne—laws which
fully Catholics
justify in
tthhe
see"
a system of ingenious tyranny." The
impolicy and odious nature of those laws is unprece-
dented, and I sincerely hope may never be imitated. No
man, I should suppose, will deny that these Acts, now hap-
pily repealed, are direct infringements on the treaty of Li-
merick. lam sure the Right Hon. Gent. opposite will not
deny this, for he has himself declared he is glad that syste mhas been departeelfromcde a
from, odious, impolitic, and oppressive
In such a o
as it was.that comprised in the penal
laws, I am satisfied the Right Hon. Gentleman never
con-
on of the meaning of the T .
that his constriction
could have concurred. The Right Hon. Gentleman
tended
correct, on the ground that, in the famous
of Limerick was
Butler, at the bar of the Irish
argument of
House of Commons, the infraction.. of the treaty was con-
sidered not in the light of a violation of political rights,
privileges. The Right Hon.
sirr.eoby
but as an injury
to private
in that able, lawyer-like,
Gentleman was of opinion that,
eminent individual referred
and public-spirited speech of the
to, the injury to private rights, anti uot the public wrong,
inflicted by the breach of the compact was referred to; and
on this ground the Right Hon. Gentleman concluded that
who, be it in the opinion of Sir Toby Butler himself,
the
re-
membered, was a party to the treaty in question,agree.
any
I beg leave
ment extended only to private rights, and did not byto
means apply to political privileges. Now,
say, the Right Hon. Gentleman is wholly mistaken as re-
garde that fact ; yet, had it been otherwise, even if Sir
Toby Vutler did not on the occasion in question insist upon
the injustice done to public privileges, while he was pri
n-
cipally engaged in condemniug an injury inflicted on private

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that treaty, all the Roman Catholics of that country were
to be indemnified, and restored to all the rights and pri-
vileges which they enjoyed under the Government of
Charles 11. Now, the Act which excluded Roman Ca..
tholies from Parliament, was confined to England, and
did not extend to Ireland ; for long after the passing of
that Act, the Catholics continued to sit in Parliament
there—they continued to enjoy this privilege upon the
faith which, it was then believed and acted upon, King
William bad pledged to the people of tharland—and that
country did for a period enjoy those benefits to which, ac-
cording to Bishop Burnet, all were admitted as British
subjects, upon taking the oath of allegiance, while at the
same time they were not called upon to take the oath of
supremacy. Now, Sir, I think if there be any meaning
in the words of that treaty—if any sense were conveyed by
it—if ggod faith is to be relied upon—if promises freely
given and implicitly relied upon are to have any weight—
the people of Ireland are entitled, and have since that pe-
riod been entitled to all the advantages enjoyed by any
other portion of the people of this realm. Whoever looks
into the history of that time, will see and feel that such
claims the people of Ireland have—that such claims are
grounded fairly and justly upon the Treaty of Limerick, the
treaty which we basely violated, and of the violation ofwhich
we have since been so much ashamed, as to have granted—
grudgingly indeed, and by degrees only, many of those rights
theywere justified in demanding, of nearly the whole of which
they were deprived under the reign of Queen Anne. But I
still Sir, although we hare granted much, there is still
a long arrear of justice against us. Whoever looks into the
history of that period, and attentively peruses that treaty,
will see that at the moment every thing depended upon its
conclusion ; and first of all, it may be argued, and this is
perhaps a new way of considering the question, that the
people of Ireland have not had justice done them, because
at that period they were guilty of no crime—that England
has no right to inflict pains and penalties upon the people
of that country, because at that time, Ireland was but true
to her allegiance to her King—because, at that time, Ire-
land was struggling for her liberties—because, at that time,
her people were true to their cause and to themselves, not
as abject slaves, kissing the rod and worshipping at the
foot-stool of Popery, but supporting and maintaining the
interests of the family of the Stuarts—the first and the
greatest benefactors of Ireland, the first to give to that
country the protection of equal laws, the first to admit
her to the participation of equal rights. Like true and up-
right men they defended their benefactors—benefactors to
whom they felt themselves allied by the ties of gratitude, no
less than by those of allegiance. In the times of their dif-
ficulty and their distress, not in the height of their in-
fluence and their power, did they discharge their debt
of gratitude, and, in discharging it, generously in-
volving themselves in the same ruin to which those whom
they defended were devoted. The people of Ireland fought
in the cause of their legitimate Monarch—a Monarch
whom they were bound to defend no less by grateful feel-
ings than by the oaths they had sworn, and the duty which
they owed to him as their Crowned King—they battled in
his cause, they fought for him to the last, and it is more
than doubtful that they ever would have been vanquished
if their King had had the courage to defend them which
they had to defend him—if he had been true to them as
they were true to him, at the time when he most needed
faithfulness, at the time when he was most in want of
friends. But when their Monarch abandoned them2-when
be deserted their cause and his cause—when he left them
to fight their battle alone, then were the people of Ireland
guilty of no wrong—then could the people of Ireland he
charged with no crime ; they were still brave men with
arms in their hands stipulating for their own rights—sti-
pulating for what rights? For rights which it would.
have been wisdom in us to grant—for that which it would
have been equally good in us to grant as for them to have
received. Stipulating to be what To be part of the
same country—to enjoy equal rights ; rights which they
had defended so bravely as to have justified us in thinking
they were deserved—and having justified ns in considering
that trust might safely be reposed in them under one King,
because of the fidelity with which they had discharged
their duty under a former. It is, Sir, a most singular
thing that the very same feeling when considered as the at-
tribute of another part of the Kingdom—of Scotland—
should have been looked upon and taken in a light so very
different, although in that country the people had been
excited to oppose the views and the liberties of this, a
course in which they were not justified by good faith, but
to which they were led by faith basely betrayed. Sir,
their conduct to their King forms a striking and degrad-
ing contrast to that of the brave, the honest, and the faith-
ful people of Ireland. But though they owed allegiance,
and though that allegiance was owned, to the Monarch of
these Realms, you need not be referred to the Acts of 1715
and 1745, to remind you in what manner that allegiance
was kept. It is also strange, that although the Stuarts
have been long banished front this land, in this land the
Stuart principles are still favoured : yet, notwithstanding,
a people who preserved such feelings without spot or ble-
mish, have no such influence in this country as that people,
of whom so much cannot be said. It is, I say, singular
that the people of Ireland, who can be reproached with no
breach of faith, but who, on the contrary, must be con- '
sidered as objects of admiration—objects deserving of those
rewards which are called for by conduct swayed by no per-
sonal motives, but by a brave and generous determination
of sacrifices in a cause which by them was deemed just
and good—it is singular, I say, that they should be
treated as national delinquents, while applauses have been
showered ou a people who were supposed to have had
the same feelings of blind attachment to the same
cause, and who attempted much more, to injure the
established Government and the liberties of this country.
Sir, I say, and I am supported by the best authorities in
saying, that at the One of the signing of the Treaty of
Limerick, King William was so pressed upon all sides, and
felt himself in so ticklish a situation, that be sent word to
his General to make peace with Ireland upon any terms.
The historian tells us that the garrison of Limerick were
in no way distressed, in no degree in want of provisions,
while on the other side their cattle, and the means of bring-
ing the artillery to bear, were rapidly perishing; and the
army without the slightest prospect, at the very moment
that reinforcements from France were in the Shannon—
reinforcements of which, before the final ratification of
that Treaty; the garrison of Limerick could have availed
themselves. While the vessels of France were in the river
—while the balance was still most doubtful—and while the
tide of battle might have been turned by a single stroke,
the good fifth of that garrison was manifested. If it had
not been kept, who can say what would have been the con-
sequence ? Who can doubt, that if the army of Rime Wil-
liam had been obliged to retreat from before Limerick,
Ireland would have been inevitably lost ? And that, rein-
forced as she would have been, by fresh troops and by
armies from France, she would have been enabled to nuke
her cause good against all the power tyllich England might
have brought against her ? No one can say then whether
it is not to the Treaty of Limerick that we owe the esta-
blishment and the success of the revolution in England.
I say then, that the garrison of Limerick had more to give
you than you had to give theta ; they had the power of
protecting you in your new establishment, while you
bed to give them nothing. They asked nothing but to
be recognised as a part of the country, and to be ad-
mitted to equal rights with the people of any other
part. Such, then, Sir, is the history of the Treaty of
Limerick—suelt were the effects of that Treaty, and such
werl contend, the people of Ireland
are
treaty
oatpy‘uvitill'aifeoshrtlhna, grounded upon the faith upon
whide and ratified. Sir, after this
ceeintt httieht
entitled
follows a dreary, and a doleful, and a disgraceful page in
Ireland- page over which I would wil-
itilutegiv historypass of
pass,
but upon which I feel it my duty shorty to
comment. Under a system of tyranny, which followed
.. a I
the violation of that treaty, the people of Ireland seemed de-
'
pressed in spirit and broken hearted—became so, to such an
extent, that we Ourselves began to recoil from the scene to
which we had given existence. Then men of enliglatened
minds, of experience, and of information, spoke boldly out,
of the oppression under which they laboured, and began
to reflect on the means of lightening the heavy burthens
which a severe and long course of injustice had heaped
upon them. Then the Protestants of the country, too,
manifested a spirit similar in views, and with similar ob-
jects—till the people of that country, having arms in their
hands, thought to raise themselves into that importance to
which they conceived themselves entitled, and the Irish
volunteers demanded a constitution for their country. The
Catholics had by this time grown into prosperity, had ac-
cumulated wealth, and had consequently become powerful,
and in 1793. when Lord Westmoreland was Viceroy, and Mr.
Cooke the Secretary of State, they gained from this country
a right of the highest character and consequence. Sir,
when England gave to Ireland the elective franchise,
she gave her that with which, if aye mew to withhold

." Each ni

~~

proroguing the first United Parlia.nient ; When his Majesty
stated this to be a great measure with which his wishes
went. Now, Sir, I contend that it is impossible to make
oat a case mere complete in all its
parts. As a claim, on
the ground of justice, the claim of the Roman Catholics
has received the sanction of the highest authorities ; and I
am prepared to show that, on other grounds;, it is equally
defensible. It has, however, been denied that it is a
claim of justice ; and other objections to granting it have
been frequently urged. Something has heretofore been said
respecting the Coronation Oath, and it has been argued
that, on this ground, the question of Catholic Emancipa-
tion cannot be carried. I suppose, Sir, that no man in
this House will now proceed upon such an argument ; but
if there be such, I will quote for him an authority which he
will not be inclined to dispute—the authority of
Lord Liverpool, who, in the year 1525, spoke upon
this question in the other House of Parliament. Lord
Liverpool said, he could not consider the Coronation Oath
as any obstacle to the removal of the civil and political
disabilities of the Catholics. The oath was an oath to
protect the Established Church and Clergy of the realm.
The removal of the disabilities might possibly affect that
Church, but it could only do so consequently. Many wise
and good men were of opinion that it would strengthen
the Church ; and if Parliament presented a Bill to the
King for his acceptance, grounded upon this assumption,
e did not see how the King could be advised to consider
it as at variance with the obligation of the oath which he
had taken. Now, Sir, in my opinion, if any one will
take the trouble to refer to the Coronation Oath, lie
will agree with the Noble Lord ; but I am not called
upon to argue this question—it is, I think, generally ad-
mitted, this argument is unfounded, and cannot be main-
tained. I hope, then, I have made out a case which will
satisfy the House of the justice and the policy of granting
the claims advanced by the Cathohcs. I hope I have
clearly shown, first, that the people of Ireland are, by the
Treaty of Limerick, entitled to a full participation in the.
benefits of the British Constitution, to the full extent time,
they were enjoyed by them under the reign of Clarice else
Second ; and also th'at by the Union of England and Ire-
land, the people of Ireland had every reason to- believe
they were acting under pledges given to them by tiro Go-
vernment of that day, that they should be fully admitted
to the benefit of the Constitution of the country. The
Roman Catholics, I contend, only ask that from us which,
in sound policy, we ought to give. Their claim, it is
true, is founded in justice ; hut I say, that if Ireland has
no right to make any claim—if she stood strictly in
the situation of a conquered country—the conduct we
have displayed towards her could be defended by re
example, because it is the interest of the conqueror to try
by every means to anialgantate the conquering with the
conquered land, and to admit to equal rights those who are
equally bound to the support of both. Such is the wise,
the natural, and the just course—such is the course which
the policy of all nations has taught them to adopt—such is
the course which we ought long since to have adopted, with
regard to Ireland—but as we have not done so, such is the
plan we ought now to pursue. I say, if Ireland then, has
never forfeited her claim, vet if in 1823 she cannot retract
the declaration she was forced to snake in 1813—that
" every thing is to be expected from our fear, and nothing
from our love"—how greatly is that claim enhanced, hese
doubly are we bound to grant that which she demands._._.
But, Sir, what we are called upon to do, is what has beer
done by the whole civilized world, which may be placed in
a map before us, to be our guide. Examples are so nume
rous and so familiar, that it is unnecessary for me to quote
any. There are one or two other arguments more, which
have been ad;anced against the Catholics, to which I feet
myself hound to advert. There are, it is contended, othea
difficulties in the way of this question, and though I arc
persuaded the Right lion. Gentleman opposite would
stop at no difficulties, if lie were once convinced tiles
good faith in treaties called upon him to grant their
demands, yet it is upon those difficelties that be rests
his opposition to their cause. With respect then es
these difficulties. What arc they? Do they not vanish
before argument? Can they bear the test of inquiry?
the speech of the Earl of Liverpool, in which he stated his
opinion, that the Coronation Oath can in no way retartt
the progress of the question, he places very great stress
on the point that Catholics hold a divided allegiance. Upon
this topic I will take leave to say, that the Catholics hold
no divided allegiance. The argument was put many years
ago, when the public mind was not quite so much en-
lightened as it at present is ; and a message was sent to the
Catholic Universities, requesting to be informed upon this.
point. Now, Sir, what was their answer—that they, fee
Representatives of the University—were struck wits este-
nishment to learn, that in the 18th century such questions
could be put. Their reply was, that no man, that no body
of men whatever, had power to weaken the 'union between
a Sovereign and his people, still less he is to absolve a people
from their oath of allegiance. Such a declaration to the
same effect was very recently made by the Roman Catholic.
Bishops of Ireland ; hut, what is more singular, or, rather
more striking and satisfactory, is the fact that the Pope hitre
self, when addressed with respect to Mexico, in his Manifests,
of Jan. 29, 1825, declines all interference between that State,
and the mother country, and alleges that he can interfere is
matter unconnected with the Church; and that he in to way
interferes in civil matters. So that this alarm about di-
vided allegiance is altogether innocuous. The Douay Cot.
lege was also questioned ; but as I do not believe the "elouse
credits a single word relative to this divided allegiance,
so
I cannot consider it necessary to argue the point, that 111P11,
virtuous and honourable men, as it will be admitted many
of them are, are not to be believed upon their oaths. Sir,
the history of this country proves that under all circum-
stances, and at all times, the Roman Catholic subjects of
tine King have been faithful and loyal to the King, the
Constitution, and the country. There is no one who wilt
deny this assertion, and therefore it is unnecessary to sup-
port it by facts or by examples. I then, for one, Sir, and
I trust and believe there are thousands who will join with
me in the sentiment, cannot feel satisfied that they should
continue to be deprived of their rights, any more than I car.
be satisfied to relinquish the advantages they have gained
vantages
we ha‘,e
acquired for us. I cannot consider myself justified in continuing to
makean tag teshe xtls,ih so ungrateful
aret rn i
for
the
thanec
oimportant attl‘h
0.
wisdom of their forefathers. Sir, what we ask is not filk•
the Catholics only—l protest against this narrow• mode ot\
considering the question. It is trot a Catholic question
merely, it is equally a Protestant question, and as :such it
ought to be argued and considered. It is, Sir, a questions
which involves the interests, the peace and the happiness
of England, no less than it does that of Ireland, which
forms so extensive and so important a portion of Great.
Britain. It is strictly a question of eina:nce—a question,
whether or not England shall be still further exhausted
its
her resources by forcing and continuing a system of injtise tice and oppression. In whatever way it shall be looked at with the microscopic eye, or with the extended
view which takes in the whole political world—there is
no great interest that not be affected by the decision
to which you will come this night. At this particular
period, the advocate of such a cause as that placed in my
m
bands, cannot refrain fro reminding you, that there is
nothing, so cheap as justice—nothing so costly as oppres'
sion. Let 114 therefore, even with a mere economical vicu:
of the question, reader justice—even tardy and reluctant:
j ustice—untu uur fellow-subjects, who are as well entitledo
to their rights under the English Constitution, as
se'
,5
:
nurselves; and in doing so, we shall achieve ii the
way of economy— we shall effect a more
r Exchequer,
ortant saviu~
former times the strong-holds .
—preserve more scrupulously the funds in ois ,
than could be done by any system of
rigid—than by the labours of soy Finance. Committer,
of which have been the seats of reit:.
this important gees-
however able..—(Hear, hear.)--On
don I would recommend to the arouse to consider, and,
take advantage of the examples afforded by other ceentries.
Let us look over those P
of religious persecution—let.us oto Germany—let us
Europe, which have been in
look to France
I let us look to the , . . .
groins warfare ; d +l
king's uommious
Hanover—to the King am of the nietherlands, to Hollare,
to Prussia ; and haying looked over the whole of Europe,
let us go to the other hetnisls
here--anil so take in both the.
old and the new worlds-e-wliat shall we find ? That wheees.
that principle of
everpeace, that great principle of Chris,
tianiy—releiout freedomis established', unites's) piace
and tranquillity have followed in theirsteps. (Cheers.) An
expedient of sudt a nathre as this is worth our while to
try—and above all, it is worth 'virile trying it in Ireland.
Is would produce a great change there, unquestionably—but
,ny chantte in that unhappy be better.
py country must tar the
HaVilW however, the experience of other countries under
our eyes—whether Republics, Aristocracies, Absolute Des_
Imtimils, or pure or mixed Monarchies—wherevur a great_
congregation of mankind has existed—wherever d itfei ence
formerly —both
Prevailed—the effect of such a change ;sill lie
found invariably to be such as I ardently wish—snee
as I ant perfectly convinced would flow from the
application of a similar principle, irons a similar altera-
tion in Ireland.—(Continued cheers.)—And here let
use (reverting to the reply given by the Right Hon. Gen-
tleman opposite, to the late lamented Mr. Canning, in a
former debate upon this subject), state, that there is no
pretence—there can be no pretext—advanced or invented,
for continuing the present system in Ireland. The Right
Hon. Gentleman, in his speech said, that the example o
France with respect to religious toleration, did not apply
but we are not reduced to depend solely upon the example
of France, in support of our position. A very able pamphlet
has lately been published beating upon this question, I
portions
of
economy,t! ieP

any other right, it was most absurd to entrust her-4 more
short-sighted course than such a course was never adopted
by any Ministry entrusted with a country's affairs. I❑
giving, her such a power she gave her that which Arai.
mides required, a point on which she might have moved
the whole of this country; and have moved it in a manner,
which, if she had not been speedily satisfied, might have led
to the destruction of both. Sir, the Catholics have grown
up to be men-_a dreadful struggle ensued—a scene of hor-
ror, of desolation, and of blood, which I earnestly wish
could he for ever obliterated from the history of that coun-
try—the hind so gifted by nature, and so calculated to bless
as well as to nourish all to whom it had given birth—was
converted into a land of suffering and of misery, scarcely,
if ever equalled, and not to be thought upon without a
shudder—

rew
New widows howl ; new or crymorn
,new sorrows
Strike Heaven on the face."
Sir, the picture, created by the imagination of the Poet, is
but a feeble picture of what Ireland at this period actually
suffered. I will not dwell upon•this topic ; but I should
not do justice to the cause 1 advocate, if I did not bring to
your recollection that which has occurred, in order to
make you think of that which might by possibility here-
after arise. I should not do my duty if I did not direct
your attention to those times and to those scenes, when it
was not saying too much to say, that only groans came
from every town over which the Vicegerent swayed, when it
was truly said that the King's Viceroy could not pass forth
from his castle wall, without his horse's hoofs being bathed itt
blood. The scene must fail of description—language is
too weak to picture it—its horrors can be conceived by
none but those by whom they were witnessed—it was a
scene which the great historian might have been depicting
when he described those horrible calamities, which he
considered to have been the very worst to which human
nature had ever been rendered liable, but which, I do be-
lieve, the evils tinder which Ireland at this time laboured
far surpassed :
" Nobilitas opes, omissi, gestique honoree pro erimine, et
ob Nittal. certissimum exitium. Nec minus prtnia de.
later= invisa (ram scelera ; cum alii sacerdotia et con-
sulatus ut spolia adepti, procurationes alii et interiorem po-
tentiam, agerent. Odic et retTore corrupti in dominos
servi, in patronos liberti ; et quibus deerat inimicus, per
atnicos oppresai."
Sir, let us get rid, if we can, of that shame and that
opprobium which attaches to us for the manner in which
Ireland has been treated forso long a period. Let us, al-
though it be somewhat late to set about it—let us try to
make Ireland forget—and the Irish are prone to forget ;
for if their feelings are quickly alive to injuries sustained,
they have no less a lively sense of gratitude for benefits be-
stowed—let us try to make Ireland forget the miseries we
have heaped upon her. Now, Sir, we come to another
period—_a period at which, I think, strong as the pledge
of good faith given at the treaty of Limerick to admit to
equal rights and privileges the people of Ireland, a still
stronger pledge was given. I allude, Sir, to the union of
that country with this. (Hear, hear.) On this point no
man will be disposed to question the authority of Mr.
Pitt; and 1 call upon all those Hon. Gentlemen, who
profess respect far the name of that individual, to bear me
out in the statement, that to this very day that name is
tarnished, not by any want of inclination in him to do that
to which he knew himself pledged, but by his want of
power to redeen, that pledge which he felt and knew he
had given—a pledge which still stands unredeemed before
both countries—before! Ireland and before England. It is
true that it is but the limb, though a large limb, of the
same body; but the United Empire sees still unredeemed
that pledge which it saw given, and which it knows was
given. It will be in the recollection of all who knew Mr.
Pitt, that about the period to which I refer, he took an
enlarged view of the state of the British Empire. He
saw and lamented the afflictions under which Ireland
suffered—he saw and knew that such a state was nut to
be endured, and he wished, earnestly wished, to pre-
vent its continuance. He saw also, that the time was
now come—a time for which not only he but thousands
with him earnestly desired—when Ireland was to be made
what in sound policy it ought to be, a component part
of this Kiagdom, and to be incorporated with Eng-
land. He saw that the possibility of carrying this desir-
able and important measure was now within his reach—
and I entreat the House of Commons to consider well be-
fore it defeats the measure it is now considering—a mea-
sure, but for the prospect, I had almost said the certainty
of which, that other measure—the measure of the Union—
might never have been. This one measure—.the measure
I am now advocating—was not only considered, but dis-
tinctly held out by Mr. Pitt, as the great inducement to
the adcption of the other—it was, Sir, a measure which
was looked for and expected, and but for the expectation
of which the heart of the Union would have been plucked
out—Union would have been made disunion, and we should
have seen the time one of unexampled difficulty and dan-
ger to the country. Seeing Ireland as it was, without any
means of healing its wounds--and seeing in that country
such a Parliament as it then had—Mr. Pitt saw it neces-
sary that that Parliament should, for once, do an act of
justice, by committing an act of suicide—and in order
that it might, with greater certainty, and with greater
speed, be incorporated with England, he placed over that
country a Government so virulent, as to render it certain •
that in the state in which it then was, it could not long
stand ; and shortly, even in spite of themselves, the Par-
liament of Ireland were obliged to yield, and to undertake
the humiliating task of their own annihilation. Such be-
ing the state of Ireland, and such being the intention of
Me. Pitt, a pamphlet was sent out by one of the Secre-
taries of State, Mr. Cooke—and after that, I believe,
another pamphlet, by one of the bitterest foes of Ca-
tholic Emancipation, Dr. Duigenan—both of which
stated, that "if Ireland were incorporated with Eng-
land, there would be on reason why Emancipation
should be longer withheld." This Dr. Duigenan, Sir, is
a witness beyond suspicion, because no more bit-
ter enemy had the Catholics at any time to encounter.
Mr. Pitt then, having sent the manifests from the Castle
by the hands of this Mr. Cooke, and feeling that the
people of Ireland listened, as they always did listen, to the
voice of conciliation, he pushed forward his great measure,
and having given to that people the distinct intimation
that the measure—the great and important measure—of
Catholic Emancipation, was to follow that measure which
was then, though not without great difficulty, about to
take place; they, the people of Ireland, placed the most
perfect reliance on the good faith of this country, and Mr.
Pitt succeeded in his plans—plans which were of the
utmost consequence and benefit to England; and well
might they have confided in the good faiths of England—be-
lieving, as they did, in the super-eminent abilities of that
great Statesman—knowing that he had been so long in
power--having faith iu the influence of his great name—
and participating in the general impression, that all be
said anti did would be acknowledged and adopted acting
from those feelings, and under such conviction, they sup.
ported the proposition for a legislative union. I have no
doubt, Sir, it will be contended that the people of Ireland
were not swayed by promises held out to them at the time
of the Union ; but, as I have naturally been looking over
many documents, I have found one which I little expected
to meet. It is, Sir, a letter front this Doctor Duigenan,
to whom I have just referred, and whom A have justly cha-
racterised as the bitter enemy of the Roman Catholics. In
this letter be says-a." if the proposal of Unioo of the
British nation be adopted, the preponeleranco of Protest-
ants will then he so great, as to render it no longer neces-
sary to place any restraints on the Raman Catholics." In
the pamphlet by the Secretary of State (Mr. Cooke),
to which I have also alluded, written in the year 1798,
occurs the passage--_" On the completion of the Union,
no reason will longer exist for withholding the demands of
the Roman Catholics; because that body, which is now so
powerful, will be no longer st, whets amalgamated with
the whole British population," And to this paragraph the
representative of Mr. Pitt's Government in behind adds
another, and states his opinion, that " the few remainiig
benefits may then safely be added." And now, Sir, hay:
to refer to Mr. l'itt's speech, as delivered by him
House of Commons in 1801—" As to the ressonlis," in the
ob-

serves, " for my resigning, I am perfectly willing to sub-
mit them to the House. I and some of my colleagues felt

Government that
it our duty to propose a measure, without which the Union
the.
lmt I
of this country with Ireland must of necessity be incom-
plete; when I found it was impossible to carry that mea-
sure, I felt that I could not, consistently with my duty
and honour, remain any longer in the Government. What
opinionsndrto o °d11) eb
t 3 be
u
measure I should have brought forward, and have used all
my exertions to carry it into effect." Again, sit, the
understood, trniafyl had remained entertain
I not,
doctrine, which I have laid down, was given in a speech
from the Throne by his Majesty George the Third: when

Liam that of Mr. G. Knight—(Hear, hear)—who, in
support of his arguments in favour of a conciliatory settle-
ment of this question, adduces proofs, too, which cannot
be doubted, being those put, forward by, one who has been
himself an eye-witness to all he 'states, and who comes
forward with his valuable testimony in support of the
rights of our Catholic fellow subjects. What does Mr.
linight say ? That in Prussia the Catholic. Portion of the
population of that Monarchy amounts to 4,000;000-41e Pro-
testants, to 6,ooo,ooo—and the remainder of a population
of,.eleven millions, (namely, one million) is:made up of
Calvinistic Presbyterians. Yet there, in Prbssii;• perfect
peace and tranquillity prevail. Now, it is impossible to
conceive a state of society more illustrative than this of the
blessings resulting from religious toleration. The' King
on the throne professes a religion in which, comparatively,
very few of his subjects concur with him, aad yet, religious
toleration has there produced its uniform and .never•failing
and peace. —(Hear, hear. )-1
consequences—tranquillity.
was going, previous to this discussion, to reply to the argu-
ments, or rather the observations, of the Right Hon. Gent.
opposite in his answer to Mr. Canning. The Right Hon.
Gentleman on that occasion said, " it is very well to quote
France or Germany, where the Catholics form the majo-
rity of the community—no danger can there be apprehended
to the majority by concessions to the Protestants, who form
the minority—no apprehension can he apprehended to the
Established Church of the Catholics from admitting the
minority to the exercise of all their political rights."—
The Right Honourable Gentleman continued thus " Now,"

cal(' he(Mr. Peel), "my Right Hon. Friend (Mr. Can-
ning) must shew me the applicability of these eases to
Ireland, where the Catholics are the majority, and the
Protestants, that is those of the Established Church, the
minority." The Right Honourable Gentleman, much
to his honour, declared upon that occasion that be file-
,T,ended upon argument for the maintenance of his opi-
nions, and scorned to avail himself of what had a few years
previously been resorted to in resistanc;: of the Catholic
Claims—the cry of " No Popery."—(Loud cheers.)—His
Right Hon. Friend (Mr. Canning) said to hini (Mr.
Peel), " You are not afraid of Popery?"--" No," said the
Bight Hon. Gentleman, " but the examples, for the rea-
ssos I have stated, being inapplicable to Ireland, I cannot
allow them to have any weight in influencing my view of
the qu°.stion•" Now, although out of doors a man would
he laughed and sneered at who should confess he was afraid
of Popery, yet, to this House, it if; sometimes allowed to
him to avow his r;vprehensions--but he was always called
upon to prove his gr.,unds for them. It is, therefore, a
great point gained, to find that the Right lion. Gentleman
is not afraid of Popery—k laugh)—consequently, not
having the fear of the Pope, or .^7f the Pretender, before his
eyes—he not being afraid of thugs things which were
considered (wrongfully I maintain) to have called for
measures to ward off the dangers likely to arise to our
establishments from the Pope or his religion—if, I say,
the Right Honourable Gentleman . gives up this, lie
gives up all apology for continuing those measures of
defence.--(hear.)--If any dangers menace the establish-
ment from concessions, let the Right lion. Gentleman
meet them, and provide a security against them, and lam
cure the Home will concur in them.—(Hear, hear.)—llut
let us not continue those no-securities, which ought to be
abandoned, being no longer necessary. Let us return.-
31r. Pitt, at the very period when he proposed to carry
the measure f,tr a legislative union of England and Ireland,
was an advocate for Catholic Emancipation, and calcula-

fed upon it as a result of the union, nay, promised that it
thould flow from it. Now, if any danger could be appre•
'headed from concessions,, surely it was to be dreaded a'
that period when Ireland possessed an independent legislo
ture; and the large majority of the people being, as a
regent, Catholic, he must, if such a thing 'night to be
feared at any time, then have apprehended somethieg, but
he .entertained no such dread ; -and now that the measure
of the Union has been carried—now that the Irish Legis-
lature is no more=-does not the argument of the night
Honourable Gentleman, like the elephants of Pyrrhus,
which fell hack upon and destroyed his own army,
demolish his own ease, and does he net admit that if
danger ever existed, (awl the only ground gem' justifi-
cation of this harsh and exclusive measure was.the ex-
istence of danger) it must here then existed ? . Yet
even he must admit, Abet since the Union, that argil.
raetit has been completely removed ; for all have since
that period been of the national church. It is Absurd to,
talk of the Church of Ireland, when it is the Church of the
United Kingdom. If it be so—if there be, indeed a
Church of Ireland, then there has been no union, and the
Act that has passed was puerile and childish—aggravated
by every evil that could be inflicted upon a country. The
only argument, therefore, that Las been heard in support of
the present system has been founded on the nem-,se:ty for
its ; but even the Duke of Wellington him-
self must see that the whole state of the question is chang-
ed, and I an; convinced he will consider is in a totally dif-
ferent point of view from that takeit by the Right Hon.
teentleman (Mr. Peel.) I hope that the single, manly
vied of the Duke of Wellington will perceive the absurdity
esf continuing restridlans—all necessity for them, real .o-r
imaginary, having passed away. (Cheers.) Ido not wish
to press that Noble Duke-4 do not wish to prose the
King's Ministers without cause ; they have already (lops
much—(lourt and eOntioned cheering)—they have done that
which, in the eyes: of all those who are usually elenominated
bigotted Churchmen, was the tvotst that could have been
done, and therefore, for all that is to. follow, they no:et
have been prepared. (Loud cheers.) .1 consequently trust
that the Duke of Wellington will take that enlarged view
of the sutrject, of which ,his capacious mind is capable—
that he who never found any real danger in the pursuit
of victory will not suffer the phantoms of imaginary danger
to deter hires from this great and noble consummation of
a nation's happiness. (Cheers.) if the Duke of Welling-
ton shall add this glory to his already transeendant renown,
the glory of being the pacificator of Ireland, be will become
the equally glorious consolidator of England's eQWfr.—
(Cheers).--.4 glory greater than any of those Oiled by Voe
in the field of battle—(Cheers)—and he will as the same
sisle be making some recompense to the brave Catholics
who fell in their co-operation with him in asserting the
onlitary prowess of England, and who, in so dying, bound
round their own brows a portion of those laurels
which they had so often wreathed around his sword. In
doing this, he will have done more for himself, morefor his
Sovereign, and more tor his country, than it ever before
fell to the Ist of man to achieve—even all his own great
glories will he absorbed in the grateful recolleetion of the
benefits he will thus have conferred upon his Sovereign
and on this country.—(Load and long continued cheering.)
It is asserted, that the Catholics are inadmissible to those
eights which they now claim. When those who make
this aseertien are asked for the proof they have to over, they
,ny, like the ttown in the play, that they have an awkwer,
hot they forget.---(o. laugh.)—" l'ut to us," say they "any
question you like, you will find us always prepared"-ehut
when premed, nreanswer een they call to mind. It is m-
erited that the Catholics owe allegiance to the
pope, They also, it will be admitted, owe equal al-
egianee to a Catholic as to a Protestaet Sovereign.
Now, tiaia being the case, what f ,contend for is,
that this divided allegiance is however infinitely more
dangeroue to a Catholic than m a Protestant Sovereign,.
--(Hear. )--If it be dangeroue at all, it must he dangerous
n a great
degree in a Catholic country—but
in our own, a
Protestant Governtwor, where no such thing as divided
allegiance exists (for the idea rid'it is repudiated by the
Catholics, and I agree with than), there is no country in
the world where ao little danger cool/lite apprehended from
the admission of Catholic; as in this mixed
such a 7ernrnent of
England—(a Protestant State)
en if thieg es d'
hith is ;0 be kept sided allegiance existed. The Catholics ha-e been
charged
mitt holding the doctrine that on
haespprwoll
hereti:'s ; now, as the whole of then.
cot Inc. •
'6 X hope we shall hear
that the ratholic9 do keep good fa' ,
no more ()Obis contindinm—divided ge'n"s ;(ntri)o
In opposition te the Catholic Claims,
references
t to eo Fa-
the uninformed peetisans of days now pas f
turn—those days wien had and unfeeling men go,. y
siert of power—but Would it not he the acme Of vulgar ,
Teatime), to visit the crime:'4' such men upon the present
" bloody
generation ?—(Cheers.) For inntance, we talk of
Queen Mary," and "the monster Phi* IL ;" but would
it not be a monstrous injustice, that because atrocities were
perpetrated in their day, that the Catholics of the present
eleolld be doomed to stiffer? Equally unjust Would it he
,es to accuse the Roman, of the acts of the monster Nero.
.The acts of Philip and Alary, and of Bishop Banner, must
not, therefore, be attributed to the Catholics of their own
day, and surely not revenged upon those of the Feseett
tires. There is, 7ispreover, another circumstance respect-
ing the Catholics of ste4end of that day, whiCh goes a great
the stetements made against them ;
may towards falsifying
but here let me exemplify the .I:se made by the opponents
of the Catholics in thee our .own .tilnea, of references to
f
bloody Queen Maly," and " the aggots pf
,Smithfield." I
know a certain parish, in which the parson bogy went
round to his parlabioners, asking their signatures os a pcq,.
lion against the Catholic claims. " Noi" said his pg..
"the won't sigoalor we do not know any thing
tad of the Catholics." "Wilet;" replied the parson, edo
? Have you no
• you know nothing of bloody Queen Z. d?" Overcome
knowledge of the burnings in Smith Eel
by this argument, the people put their hands to the peti-
tion, not against the Catholics, but 'to prevent the recur-
rence of such times as those of bloody Queen Mary.,-
(Hear, hear.) Now, instead of thus seeking to obtain
signatures to petitions for the maintenance of those
ttstrictivo laws of which the Catholics coxnplain, I

contend that it ought to be the desire, the most anxious
wish, of the clergy of the Established Church, to get
rid of them.—(Cheers.) I was about to state that
something very remarkable occurred about the time
of Philip and Mary, which would go to acquit the Irish
Catholics of any participation in the guilt of the enor-
mities perpetrated.. in the reign •of Mary. At the very
time when those ..fires were lighted in Smithfield, Sir
James Ware wrote from Ireland
.that which fulls' corrobo-
rated the statement of Sir John DavieS, that there was no
people on earth who more loved indifferent justice than
did the Irish. Sir James Ware states, that " when the
Protestants,fled away from England, to avoid thebigotry and
the persecutions of Bishop Bonner and the fires of Smith-
field, they took refuge in Ireland, where they were received
with all that kindness, all that hospitality, for which the
Irish have at all times been rernatkable." Such a religion
as that professed by those Irish cannot be a bad one. When
the Catholic religion was re-established in England—when
the party which had gotten the upper hand were exercising
every means of retaliation—what did those whom we have
been in the habit of calling the " savage Irish" do? In-
stead of inflicting similar sufferings upon those who had
fled to them for refuge, they, on the contrary, stood con-
spicuous as their, protectors, permitting them to remain in
the undisturbed exercise of their religion. Therefore, as
even upon that score the people of Ireland must be held
absolved of all the cruelties attributed to them, the House
ought, on the other hand, to feel admiration for those poor
people of Ireland, against whom no reproach of that de-
seription can be made. Mr. Gaily Knight, in his pamph-
let, seeks to chew that in all countries, and in all religions,
religious persecutions have existed. Nothing could be
more intolerant than the Calvinists have been, yet cer-
tainly nothing could be more unjust than to charge upon
the Presbyterians of the Church of Scotland of the pre-
sent day the assassination of Archbishop Sharp, and the
other atrocities committed by those lunatics, the Cove-
nanters—equally unjust as to revenge upon the Catholics
the acts of bad men of former days, for which vulgar pre-
judice would yet hold them accountable.—(Cheers.)—The
truth is, that it is not the part of Catholics, or of any other
sect or set of religionists, to perform such acts. It is
not the religion of a man which influences him to perpe-
trate such enormities. These things have always been done
by bad men, whom religion could not restrain. It was
Banner's own bigotted, malignant, and interested passion,
which induced him to persecute. lied Bonner lived in
these days, lie would have been—what I will not name—
so hostile to the spirit of-the time, that it does little credit
to those to whom it belongs. (The Honourable Ba-
ronet here drew a picture of a person, who throughout
a long life had held an exalted situation in the State,
in which his doubts and hesitation upon all topics con-
nected with the duties of that situation, had become
characteristic of him.) A great legal individual,
possessed of great professional acumen, perfectly comne-
tent to -decide upon points connected with his office—on
which, however mischievous as was delay, much more so
even than the greatest despatch could have been—he uni-
formly exercised the utmost degree of caution and hesita-
tion—yet that upon this iluotion—upon the question of
Rel:gioui Liberty—that great, that universal question,
which had engaged the minds of all the great men, all the
great Statesmen of the preceding century, who had in for-
mer years advocated in that House, that cause, with their
gigantic talents—for (continued the Hon. Bart.), there
were giants in those days—they who had prepared the sail
—they who had sown the 'seeds of which lie trusted they
(the House) were to reap the harvest. In opposition to
the conduct and the opinions of all these, the learned per-
son never hesitated, or doubted for a moment, the course
which, on that subject, he should adopt. Among those
great 'nen (continue(' the Hon. Bart.) were to be found the
the names of Burke, Pitt, Fox, Sheridan, Grattan, Wind-
ham, Canning—and last of all that great man who, if his
physical pony ors had permitted him, would, even now, per-
sottally support it—l mean • Lord Grenville ;—who has,
through all hie life, been the advocate of this cause, and
who, if Providence hail allowed him, would still be found
foremost in the ranks of its most strenuous supporters.
The opinions which lie had first formed upon this tines-
tion he still retaine-a=opinions inconsistent with any inte-
rested views—(lfear, 'hear, hear)—on the contrary, they
are opinions in opposition to his own interest--opinions •
not only neeprnmended by all his wisdom, but also by the
purity, and honesty, and integrity, which in this, and in
this only, influenced h:gi to agree with come of his distin-
guished contemporaries—influenced also, I ought to say, by '
a sense of the importance of the subject, and also, by its
necessity to ceaure the vital happiness and secueity of the
country. (The Hon. Baronet here again reverted to the
individual whose portrait he had attempted to draw, and
dwelt once more at 'considerable length upon the hesita-
tion of that individual, upon matters where decision was
r«.l.zeraary aud practicable, and his promptness in determin-
ing upon the Catholic Claims.) It would be idle (conti-
nued the Hon. Batonet) to contend that at this day there is
any value affixed to the Pepe' Bulls. They no longer fight.
Like Bottom in the play, they " roar you as gentle as the
euclting dove."—(A laugh.) "'hey have not ;m ach influence
a. 7), where, and least of all in •Ireland. It is not many years
since the ,Catholics of irelend refused to concur in what
ti Pope was willing to coincide. The Pope agreed to
certain conditions for the eettiement of this question, whieli
the Irish Catholics declared they would not consent to.
I will not go through the history of former times, or bring
too fully before you the magnanimous example offered us
tan this point by Queen Elieabeth, perhaps ORC of the
wisest t-ihneereigns that ever sat on the throne of England.
I will not lio4 net for your aim what may be thought
unattainable. Nevertheless, for an instant, let us glance
e.t her eituation and bier conduct when surrounded by
dangers which threatened to overwhelm her. - By the
greater part of the Catholic world she was considered as
an illegitimate child, and, as such, without title to the
throne. Site cared little for any title but the only one
worth caring for—her Parliamentary title—end that the
affection of her subjects secured her—that she considered
*;officient security from the State, the Church, and the
Throe. 51w found it her security against Philip H. in
oio!I possesfia4 of, and wielding with no weak arm, all the
power Of the F4pa-nien Inonarchy—a monarchy then so
extensive, that it was the beneS pf Castilian pride that
the sun rose and set in the Spanish dominianna and which
had just been increased by possessions then considered of
more value than they have since been found ; I mean the
inexhaustible treasures of the new world—she found it her
security against the comhinat;nn of the Catholic
Guis world
against her.e-elie founi it her pecoriq when the es
held the power of r Jaare—wheo the life of henry IV. was
taken by an aeseeseinenwhen the streets of Paris flowed with
blood on the eve of St, Baralt4entew, and the Dee of
Alva tyrannised in the low countrio. in such days f
peril, iu a new state, just after the Refermation, when at
!nisi:one-half of the people were Catholics, Elieeheth heel ,
too A'Anait magnanimity, as well as wisdom, to listen to
the suggcs:tions of persons who wished to fill her with sus-
pleitone of the Catlinlies. 6' No," she replied! te their insi-
nuations, ts bave not the ,C7astboilo Noblemen and Gentle--
men of England honour, estates, c,-;urtesy? Will
they, think ye, sacrifice them? Your syspiciops'a74 `e;!rs
are vain.", She trusted them, rzaguanimously
r:nel wisely
trusted them, and they nobly justified the trust she biased
;n them.—(Careers.)—This was when the Duke of parma,
the greapist Captain of the day, led the Spanish troops,
Bien considered the best in the world, and that he was ex-
pected to lead them
.aga;nset her. It was under all these
circumstane,ez drat she etood eloq, relying upon the alle-
giance of all her subjects, and by this confidence extri-
edited herself from the slifficnities which etirtonneied her.
At that time she hail not, as we are Weaned, more
than two thousand troops in Ireland, and it was a.C410:-
li linbleman that seas Admiral of the fleets she sent to
oPpnae tarns .i.p.yl,lsion of Catholic Europe. Was her confi-
denee ill planesi? ,Stserounded by dangers, which, at
the present time, it wool.el Is,' vain to think possible to
arise, was she not faithfully seyYeAl lq Catholics ?
Having heard of the dispersal of the Atikerce i.ieet by
!tempests, always anxious to relieve the imr(len;
pea V,4 a,le sent orders to the Catholic Admiral to (Us-
t?ent; 4!.1t her Catholic Admiral disobeyed then
orders, nnti -beggod tLq, he might be allowed to keep
the fleet toaetteor at Ins exrense until the storm
was completely past,
apprehended. ,-fait422: danger was to be
Thus, with a 4atlidiia'Ada.i-.4 did she
oppose Catholic invaders, and save the'cOWiy from a
Catholic invasion. Never had she the slightest reason
to doubt elie
.eeal and fidelity of the Catholics. The'y
fought her battles, and gained her victories, as undistine
'Waterloo and the
to4'tt.nnisider the imPetri-
quished from Protestants as the ratholics who fought side
of them 'to
other grea,t Fells we won duringi t
war.
Icy side with til;;lirclfe.lico:n-estlelrjeec.nto
the
befin:e us. I beg beg and etettvet
consider whether it mai'
tance of the rpiesia,s At,:v
aiotlie jell to say eoniethiug
now, at least, with respect to irelead, 1
eat them
to consider, whether it may not be well to atear,4
cu
that country those beneficent principles of religions
surest", which have been ibund to produce. peace and hap-
piness in ail times, in all the Feet of tl ie world. If their
s beneficial consequent
introduction de not .peedoce 141 tho-e
ces which Mr. Pitt thowght,the.y when he proposed
the union, which we, if we have any regard fcty name,
or respect for his character, ought to nomplete, yet
tire; e
are, I imagine, few in this House, who will venture to
nay that some of the effects he wished would not be broght
about. Such a measure may not be a panacea for all the
evils of Ireland. He is a bold man who will say, that
any one iceasur wcyld he a panacea for Ireland lent he

feriors.

is a bolder man, who being able to think at all, will
say that this measure is not likely to bring a remedy to •
some, and great alleviation to most of the evils which now
afflict that country.--(Hear, hear.) I lurie heard it said,
"What have the people of. Ireland to do with emancipa-
tion ?" I wish those persons who have said this to recol-
lect that it is impossible for people ao alive as a body to
any thing that affects a part as. the Trish, not to feel the
degraded state to which 'they are reduced. We have so
governed them that they have become united against us in
a kind of sympathetic opposition. Se that it is imposal_.
ble to touch any thing in Ireland affecting any class, but
that, like au electric shock, the stroke is felt through-
out the chain. Let us then relieve them from a
stigma and degradation they find unbearable—let us
us-relieve them from one of the greatest moral evils that
can befal man. Steep a man iri poverty to the very lips,
and his mind may remain unbrOken—but add contumely
and insult to his misfortune, and he feels the bitterness of
his situation. The greatest of all evils, mental and moral
degradation, poverty does not necessarily bring; but con-
tumely, if it fails to bring it, will rouse the energy of the
mind it cannot bend. The sensitive people of Ireland,
Hon. Gentlemen may depend it, are more alive to con-
tumely than any other people whatever. And, Sir,. re)
far from being indifferent to emancipation, every.act of the
people of Ireland proclaims their desire for it. The asser-
tion that they are indifferent to it must originate in ignorance
of the state of that country.—(Hear, hear.) They have,
Sir, the strongest of all feelings; that which, under a
wise Legislature, would he made the foundation of their
happiness—a feeling of pride in themselves, a feeling that
they do not deserve to be a degraded people. It is a feet.
ing which might serve as a fulcrum on which to move
the whole nation. If that feeling be satisfied, all other
evils, comparativaly small, will be alleviated. The feeling
of the people of Ireland is manifest on this subject What
greater proof need we seek of the desire of the Catholics
for emancipation than the collection of the Catholic Rent?
(Hear.) If it was only matter of interest to a few lew-
yers, who wish, and properly wish, to be able to reach the
highest honours their profeseon.. will alloW—or to a few
noblemen, who desire to be. placed as they ought to, be
placed, in that rank in the Legislature to which their birth
entitles them—or to a few.Commonerst who wish, as they
ought to wish, to hold seats in the Lower House of Parlia-
ment—the Catholic Rent would not be what it is. If it

were only these learned, noble, and respectable -perscos,
who were interested, the poor man would not be anlsious-
to put by a small portion of the small pittance on which he
lives, to receive what he considers a stigma and disgrace.
(Cheers.) It is said that Catholic Emancipation cannot
make the poor rich. That may he so : but at the -same
time I beg Hon. Members to consider whether what they
so triumphantly assert goes the whole length they seem to
wish. I beg then to call to mind the reasons which Mr.
Pitt adduced in support of the Union. One of the chief
was, that it would tend to snake the poor rich--,(Cheers)

—by producing that state of things in Ireland '.which
would make the country habitable to its native proprietors.
(Cheers.) That it would 'then become a field for English
speculation, and the employment of English capital ;- and
that by the force of these united and concurring causes, it
would be raised from that abject state of poverty in which
she had been so long cast, and give profitable employ-
ment to that population, which has since, to the de-
struction of English prosperity, so overflowed its bounds.
Whether or not the measure would have the effect of
drawing English capital into Ireland, it would at any rate
prevent from' leaving it that capital which is now drawn
front it, because it is in such a state that no gentleman,
unless connected with the Government, or influenced by
very powerful motives, can possibly live in it. It is im-
posible to say What measure would be a panacea for the
evils of Ireland, whether Catholic Emancipation or any
other, but I am sure, even if all the good expected from it
fail, that it would be well to relieve the people from the
eapeCtation of it. Let it be tried, even if it be certain
that no beneficial effect will flow from it. Even if all
other effects were wanting, that which, in my mind, is
worth all the rest would he sure to follow. Every man
would consider himself equal to his fellow. No one set of
men would be able to look down upon another as their in-
Then, in the word, of a modern poet, will
" Each subject boast his rights to scan
And learn to venerate himself as man."

—(Cheers.)—Peace and harmony will then prevail far
different from the jealousy and heart-burning now prevalent.
Sir, this measure is not taken up with any hostile feeling
tewards the Church of England, but quite the reverse.
The success of this measure will. not weaken the Church
of England, or, perhaps, I ought to say, of the United
Empire, but rather strengthen it. I say, that the great
enemies of the Church are those who make. it so great an '
evil, that it is impossible to support it except by. an amen.:
mutation of penal statutes. Those. Who hold-it up in that
point of view are they who wish to undermine it. If it
were true that the Church of England is so.weak,. that -it
cannot stand without such contingent grievances, as those
who oppose Catholic EMancipation on this ground assert,
I should say that it ought not to be supported. But, Sir,
it is not true, for the Church can etand without these vain
props. The Church is weakened by being made the pre-
tence of oppressing Ireland. It incurs an odium which it
is our duty to remove. Let us remove it, and it will be
much better established in the hearts of men than now—
on vain oppression. Is it right that the Church should he
thus held up as the cause of all grievances? I said at the
outset, and I say now, that I preferred the Church of Eng-
land. I prefer it for various reasons. One, which 1 think
the best any man can-have for preferring one good religion
to another, is, that I consider it to be founded upon
the most liberal, tolereut, and wise principles.—(Cheers.)
—Much, Sir, may be said in proof of this assertion ; but
I have considereble difficulty iu describing what the
Church of England is except by negatives. It is not
Catholic, yet it varies not very greatly from the
Catholic. I reipember that the Rishop of Rochester
said that the Roman Catholics were nearer and dearer to
us than any other religious sect differing from the Church
of Eegland. It is not Calvinist; yet, at the same time,
we have so touch of Celvinism in the Church, as to make
the two bear a very close resemblance, It is riot Lutheran ;
but still there was something of Lutheranism in it. Aug
what was it intended to be? The Church of England
was founded on comprehension—(Hear, hear, hear.)-_a
comprehension liberal, tolerant, and wise. That which is
most obrioninee, ehe moot foreign to its spirit, is, and
which, in the end, win be found of the greatest prejudice
to it, the principle of exclusion, against which I have this
day centendeda—(ik:wo If this principle of religious
liberty be promoted in Ireland, those benefits will follow
which in other parts of the world have followed it; and
in a shunt time England will feel the blessings of a real
union between the two countries. The Church, 1 say,
will stand more firmly without this miserable protection,
which f must call ari ineumbranee. Let the Church get
rid of what are ee;led its securities, and it will be perfectly
secure. What can be more facile than to talk of a written
paper, or a test, as being a security for the Church. Sgeh
misel able helps are looked upon jn their proper light be
liberal Churchmen in the other House. They asserted the
streng`rh of the Church in a manner which became their
learning; charity, aril eeal. - Their conduct has done tbem-
selves and the ('hu,'ch to which they nelong the highest
henour;—(fteer4.) They are better bulwarks of the
Church than any of these proposed defences that have
lately been removed,-e(lleile, hear.) Exclusion, they have
proclaimed, except in cases of dire necessity, to be hostile
to the interests of the Church. Religious tests were de-
clared by them to be inimical to religion. To use the e -
preF,7ire words of the Liebe') of Chester, religious tests
eteh.nger re;igienee sincerity. Doubtless they offer a pre-
mium to ieligidn; ineiue.eeity. in the enlightened times
in which we now live,' a ;51mp,.e anneeetneeeeent of the fact
of such tests and disabilities existing, one would tieinle.
sufficient to have them removed. They are disabilities im-
posed in times long past, for reasons long since gone.' I
say, then, that living in the year 1 A 29, far advanced in the
pen. century, one would think it sufficient to announce
the fact 'Of !heir cont;nuizer to evist, to gain the assent of
every gentleman presint'ah do aveire with 9uela insecurities
both to the Church and State. 'Die one eat. doubt th“;
if tey are an insecurity to one, the Church ana
State being interwoven, they are an insecurity to both.
The Church is represented as being to the State like
the ivy round the oak. If we invigorate the oak, then
the ivy—if the Church and State lie con-
nected iii'itAngaieepieg the State (and what more than
this raaaaure van strengthen it) ;we strengehee. the. Church.
The tests cannot, in the mind of any pe FP'
support to the Church. The declaration we make whe4i'w
e
enter this House, as it matter of form, we think not of ;
but whael we do think of it, pain must be the predominant
(Hear, iier,ea) Whenever I think of the decla-
ration we Make at that tal4 I eenai4ea Pe; 7 pronounce
• ,
a foul calumny against some or-tne meet virtuous' and }era'
In with whom I• am acquainted.' -(Cheers.) We are
enliq to tepreee sentiments of persons whom we
in "tiai 1;44 sadist;} 'O4 esteem, which are as
degrading to ourselves as thd MT IP
those against whom they are uttered—(Cheerile.--aintaienta
which no man with the common feelings of a gentleman
would venture to pronounce in any other place. (Cheers.)
Let u:-; cast off the opprobrium and shame the utterance
whirs a "decieration of that sort must draw upon us. I
cannot conceive that we shall inn any danger by no doin.
Let us remove these old, clumey securities, raised against
dangers long since passed. Let us not encumber ourselves
with the armour of other days, iptended to ward off wee-

pons no longer used. If new dangers arise, we may raise
otter defences more suited to the times. If I were ar-

going
imposed these tests and disabilities were obsolete and null,
on that plain maxim of the law, " cessante rations cessat et
ipsa lex," and no man can pretend that the reasons for these
laws are not altogether past and gone—for ever. (Cheers.)
I hope I have said enough to prevail with the House, at
least not to retrograde from those sentiments which it for-
mes* expressed on this subject. There icone other point
which I shall mention, more for the consideration if thos:.
who differ from me, than from any very great importance
which I attach to it myself. It may be observed that I
have not said a word about aecurities. My own opinion is
that there needs no securities to which a man of sense
may turn his attention at this time of day. There wants
no security but that which ie derived front subjects hav-
ing administered to them equal laws. Let equal laws be
administered, and the people will be happy; "id est
firmissimum imperium quo obedientes gandent." I wish
the Irish to rejoice in, and not to lament, as they long
have had occasion to do, their connection with this coun-
try. (Cheers.) So satisfied am I, however, of the feel-
ings of the Irish towards this country, judging from the
past, that though I call upon you to grant what I ask as
a long contracted debt, yet it will he received by them as
a boon with feelings of gratitude, and with the same goad
faith and feelings as they have evinced on all former occa-
sions to their benefactors. They have never violated their
faith in the smallest degree towards those who have bene-
Stted them, as we shall if we do them justice. If, how-
ever, there are any Honourable Gentlemen who have minds
so constituted as not to be satisfied without securities
against dangers, which, for my part, I cannot foresee,
I say to them, let us get rid of the old securities as we have
got rid of the old dangers, and then if you insist upon it,
we will devise new remedies for new evils. If you can
place faith in an amulet hung round the neck, or in a
horse shoe nailed over the door, to prevent the entrance of
witches—(A laugh)—if your fears of the imaginary
phantom you raise up to yourself can thus be allayed, I
am not one of those that would deny you satisfaction. And
those whose cause I advocate are willing to yield every
thing, save honour and conscience.—(Cheers.)—They ac-
knowledge duty to their country, but their sours their own.
Any security not repugnant to the principles of the religion
they profess (the refusal to give which is the greatest of all
the securities we can have)—(Cheers)—they are willing to
give. I think none necessary, lint I do not, therefore,
object to its being given ; for those who fancy the danger
way think it a security. Let then any security, with the
limitation I have mentioned, be proposed, and it will be
given. Any Gentleman then who thinks security neces-
sary will agree to the motion I am about to make, as the
only means of obtaining his object. When we are in
Committee, should by possibility such a feeling of the
necessity of a security arise in the breast of any man, then
will be the time-for him to propose it. The Honourable
Baronet concluded by moving—" That the House resolve
itself into a Committee, to consider the state of the laws
affecting his Majesty's Roman Catholic subjects in Ireland,
with a view to such conciliatory amendments as may be to
the general satisfaction of all parties." The Hon. Baronet
sat down amidst loud cheers.

Mr. BROUGHAM seconded the motion, which having
been read,

The SOLICITOR-GENERAL rose at nearly the !arise
time with Mr. Perceval, for whom they were loud calls,
but that gentleman yielded to the Solicitor-General, who
after the noise of cheering had subsided, said--s There is
one very important point in this question to which I ex-
pected the Hon. Baronet would have more applied himself
than he has done. When we find, that from the Reforma-
tion downwards, it has been the anxious design of this na-
tion, by laws passed with the greatest consideration, to
strengthen and confirm that Reformation, I did expect to
hear some arguments offered in proof that some change had
taken place in the opinions of those formerly removed by
those laws from the rank which they held in the State. I
expected some such arguments, in order to have induced
the 'louse to accede to this motirn. The Hon. Baronet's
wish is to have no securities or pledge ; and kern all that
we can learn, the Catholics themselves are unwilling to
give any ; yet are we called upon to grant them privileges
that will enable them to injure us. The Hon. Baronet's
proposition is to remove the restraints imposed by law for
the protection of the Established Church, from 6,000,000
of people completely under the guidance of their Priests
and Bishops---(Cheers)--and not only that, but to allow
them, if not to be through the priest, under the government
of a foreign power, at any rate, much subject to its interposi-
tion and controul. Ido say that, from the earliest period
at which England was a nation, there never his been
such a state of things as the measure the Hon. Baronet
proposes would introduce. I will endeavour to follow him
through the principal portions of his speech, and trust I
shall, be able to convince the House that the claim be has
set upon the part of the Catholics, has no ground on which
to stand. With respect, in the first place, to the Treaty of
Limerick, I think I shall chew that both its words anti
spirit are in direct opposition to the conclusion he has come
to. The Hon. Baronet says that he should like it to be
examined in a Court of Justice as the title of any other
claim might be. I will deal with him more fairly than he
wishes, for in Courts of Justice we construe all contracts
to the very letter, but in this I will put the most ample
construction the spirit of it will allow. Even then I shall
come to a very different conclusion from the Hon. Bart.
Now, it appears clear, that throughout this treaty, two sets
of persons are contemplated. In the first article, all Ca-
tholics in general seem to be included ; but the second
relates exclusively to those in the city of Limerick, or that
were then under the controul of different officers in King
James's pay. I am sure, and I say it advisedly, that the
Honourable Baronet will agree with me, that this must
be the right construction of the treaty, if be will turn
his attention to the provisions of an Act passed soon
after. The Act to which I allude is the 7th of King
William, passed in 1695. It was an Act passed for
the general disarming of the Catholics ; but he wil find
that the fourth section of it exempts from its opera-
tion all such persons us were included in the Treaty of
Limerick. What can this mean but that no Catholics ex-
cept those actually in Limerick,were affected by the treaty.
If all Catholics were included in it, the Act I have
quoted would have been inoperative. This, I think, is a
proposition which cannot be controverted. The first article,
as I have already stated, applies to all Catholics ; but the
question is, whether all Catholics are not merely to be en-
titled to the free exercise of their religion, which that article
provides, hut whether no laws were thereafter to he passed
to alter their condition in any manner. Whether, for
example, if circumstances were to arise to call for such a
measure, they were not to heexcluded from the two Houses
of Parliament ? If they meant to have bargained for any
such thing, they used words as foreign to the purpose as
it was possible for them to have found out._( Hear, hear.)
—Sir Toby Butler, whom the Hon. Baronet had jnstly
mentioned with great praise, was himself in Limerick at
the time, and passed out with the rest of the army with
all the honours of war, jt cannot be supposed that a
man of such ability, and to accomplished a scholar, could
have been concerned in, or have even known of, such an
instrument, so worded to express a meaning so different.
With respect to the ninth article, which provides that the
oath of allegience shall he the (Italy oath the Catholics shall
fake—that cannot be meant to apply to all Patheliee, but
merely to those who were then about to submit themselves.
—(Heer, hear.)—lndeed, it was impossible that it could
apply to ail Catholics, for already they were obliged to take
other oaths. All who held ptsblic ofAcee were obliged to
take the oath of supremacy.` The 2d of Elizebeth, and
the 26th of Charles 11., both imposed oaths. Now, the
'treaty could never have meant to relieve Catholic% generally
from taking these oaths, since, even if any of the persona
in Limerick had wanted to hold en office of *ate, after-
Wards, jt would have been. neceeesery for freem to takO the
oath I have mentioned.' Mine, therefore, contend is the true
construction of the treaty. But, besides the argument is
bail, for it proves ton much. If there is anything in it at
all, it applies that King William bound himself, whatever
circumstances might arise hereafter, net tq diminish the
privileges the Pathelice then enjoyed ; to that, in point
th tethOliebe off than the protes.
\701114 .
tent, for the latter, it cannot be 'Oll6l, might have his
situation altered by the Legislature in any rummer cir-
cumstances might direct. If, for example, a Protestant
was disabled front obtaining a seat in that House, unless he
had an estate of 300/. per annum in land, a Catholic
would be liable to no such disability. Is it a statesman-
'tile? view of the subject to co hack to an old Treaty made a
hoindrea c'ed chi y re,;,,rp ago, and to found an argument
now on the iffiegetf breaA`of that which wag never before
declared to be broken ? And that too without taking into
consideration the solemn cOmpicis SubSeqiiently entered
into on the occasion of the Union of England with Scot-
-470 T-eland? Is it, I repeat, a statesman-like way of
arguing i 6 piifforward such a • `freitty ? `sileppoe2 the
!lodic sliould';
legislating on a subjects rake uP some old
Treaty made in the time of the Wars between the Muses
Of York and Lancaster, of in the reign of Henry 11., or
Mieard I:,:xing on the inhiect of their legislation, I
ask; 'ought' the
Heine to place tiny reliance oe arguments
founded on doeume'ntS of such remote antienity ? Surely
not ; but how did the Irish theMselves act in relation to
this treaty? They did not consider the Treaty in the
same view that the Hon. Baronet looks at it ; for in the
Parliament that sat in the o,c.PA)ff fOlowing, not a doubt
was expressed intimating a violation of the Treaty.—
No, it was reterved for those days p assert thtiteeee(Chcers.

—I contend, that all the lawyers, from Lord Coke down-
wards, declared their opinion that England had a right

bind Ireland. In the Parliament that met in 1692,

the Catholics were asked to take that oath (of Supremacy)

and they must have declined ; for it appears there was but
one Catholic Cinimoner in that Parliament—the Repre-
sentative of the county of the town of Tuam. In fact, a
construction has been given to the Treaty of Limerick
which was never dreamed of at the time.—ln giving to
the Catholics the privileges they enjoyed in the reign of
Charles 11., it was never contemplated to admit them into
the House of Commons. Sir, there is no stability at all

in the argument. But the Hon. Baronet complains that
the Catholics have been deprived of inalienable rights; now
this is not the case. The lion. Baronet confounds natural
rights with political privileges. I agree with him, that
every subject of the state has a right to life, liberty, and
property ; and that the Government that would invade
those rights, would not only violate all law, but would be
actin on a principle whose operation must destroy that
Government itself; but to deny public offices to persons
holding opinions injurious to the state, is quite another
thing from the deprivation of natural rights; hut never,
since the memory of man, were persons holding opinions
detrimental to the state allowed to exercise office in that
state. Sir, the idea of such a thing is most absurd. Who
would make a Quaker, who holds the doctrine of non-
resistance, the General of an army? or a German Ana-
. baptist, who holds that all property should be in common,
a Judge? or one of the fanatics of the times of Cromwell,
a dignitary of the Church? Sir, the violation of natural
rights sounds well ; but the abridgment of political privi-
leges is not to be confounded with penal laws.—Penal laws
are those enactments which inflict punishments on a man
for worshipping the Divinity according to the dictates of
his conscience : against such laws I shall ever raise my
voice; but to exclude from office persons holding opinions
detrimental to the state, is not a punishment. It is ab-
surd to suppose it.
Cum ventum ad verum est, senses moresque repugnant,
Atque ipsa utilitas, Justi prope mater et 92 qui.
Sir, a review of our laws to the remotest period will show
the great caution with which our ancestors provided for
the safe and indissoluble union of the Church with the
State. Looking then at the grounds on which they en-
acted those laws, and on the circumstances of the present
time, is there, I ask, any sufficient new reason that can
warrant us in throwing open the door to rash innovations?
I will not here detail the feuds and animosities that give
rise to those laws.. It is sufficient for me that I find them
in existence, and I will not cast such a libel on the wisdom
of nur ancestors—(Cheering from the Opposition side)—
as to suppose they enacted them without adequate reason.
Sir, I contend that these laws were enacted by some of the
wisest men that ever lived. At the period of the Refor-
mation these laws were moulded by men who were the
ornaments of their times.—ln the reign of Queen Eliza-
beth an Act was passed, the preamble of which recited,
that the Commons prayed her Majesty to revive those
Acts which had been repealed in the preceding reign, con-
demning, as illegal, those claims usurped by Foreign Powers
to exercise dominion within the realm, and uniting all
authorities and jurisdictions under the dominion of the
Crown ; and it is worth remarking that the Commons in
that were claiming no new power, but the restoration
of one that had been for a season suspended. Thus the
first and second of Philip and Mary were repealed, and the
old Acts against foreign power revived. The next legisla-
tion on this subject was immediately after the Restoration,
when Arts were passed, ordering the oaths againit Popery
to be taken on entering offices in the State and Corpora-

tions. The object of these laws of the reign of Charles was
to strengthen the union between the State and the Reformed
Church. Then, coming down to the Revolution, no man
will say, that the enactments then on this subject were
more than a restoring of the laws to that condition in which
they had been before the reign of Jamesthe Second. Look
at the care with which the Coronation Oath was drawn
up—that oath to be taken by the King, by which he
promised s' to observe the laws of the land, to respect the
laws and Gospel of God, and to maintain the Protestant
Reformed Religion." But, on the obligation of this oath,
it has been said by one side that they are so strict that
they cannot be relaxed, and by those on the other side
that they are not binding on the Monarch in his legislative
capacity. My own opinion is that the Mocarch cannot,
by his Coronation Oath, give his consent to any law which
he believes in his conscience to be detrimental to the
interests of the Established Church. Nor did the legisla-
tive enactments on the subject stop here. In 1707, when
the Act of Union with Scotland passed, the same care was
taken by the legislature to exclude foreign supremacy, and
to protect the Reformed Protestant Church—for by that
Act all persons taking office were bound to take the oath
to support the settlement of the Established Church: A.
century after that came the Irish Union, when the same
caution was used for the protectiOn of the Church ; in fine,
there is not one national compact entered into since the Re-
formation, in which it has not been expressly provided,
that the Established Church should be indissolubly united
with the Government. As to the laws declaring the abo-
lition of the supremacy of the Pope over the affairs of this
kingdom, I am aware that the Hon. Baronet holds they
went only to the abolition of his spiritual and ecclesiastical
supremacy—that the temporal supremacy of the Pope is
but a bugbear, and that he claims over the Catholics of
these kingdoms only . a spiritual domination. Is it so?
No; and any person who will look into the laws will see
that more than spiritual power was claimed by that foreign
Potentate; and that the objects of all of them was to ex-
clude all'domination claimed by the Court of Rome. This
appears even from a law wrung from a most reluctant
King, in which it was recited, that England had been al-
ways subject to the Kings of England, and that the claims
of Rome to exercise power in England were un-
lawful, and ought not to be submitted to. Would
our ancestors have enacted those laws if the power
had not been claimed by the Court of Rome, or if his
temporal supremacy was a mere bugbear ? Would the act
of premunire have biro passed in those times, if thereikad
been no reason to dread the power of the Pope? Wry,
Sir, even Doctor Doyle himself, one of the titular Bishops
of the Roman Catholics, has acknowledged that the Pope
enjoys not only spiritual and ecclesiastical power in these
kingdoms, but real authority ; and that these formed part
of that faith which every Catholic was bound to believe.
All persons know that testamentary causes of Catholics
were sent to Rome for decision—but what have testa-
mentary causes to do with the spiritual supremacy of the
Pope ? Besides, the Pope gave decisions on questions of
the legitimacy of the children of Catholics, and on doing
so made appropriations of the hereditary property con-
nected with the question, and so exercised a domination not
merely spiritual, but really temporal. The question then
for our consideration is, whether that change of opinion
has taken place in the opinions of the Roman Catholics
which could warrant us in throwing open the doors of
oMee to them without exacting any test for the security of
the Established Church. I shall prove that no such alte-
ration has taken place, but that their religion' opinions are
still the same as ever, and productive of the same mischief
—nay more, I say that the Catholics ask now of us more
than ever they enjoyed when theirs was the religion of the
land—for there was no time, I contend, no period in our
history, when the Bishops were not appointed by the
Crown; but that they object to the interference of the
Crown in the appointment of their Bishops, appears from
the conduct and declarations of those among them most
interested in the question-a-these Thai:lns—for I find them
after the Legislative had intimated a wish to grant their
claims on receiving certain securities ; I find that, on the
27th of May, 1813, the Catholic Bishops declared in
assembly, that the security demanded was inconsistent with
the interests of the Catholic religion. Now what was that
security? That no person disallowed by the Crown, should
bp appointed Bishops. Nor were the Bishops the only
authorities against the concession of that security, they
were followed by the Parish Priests of the Diocese of
Dublin, who resolved, that to grant the power of ap-
pointing Catholic Bishops, to
.persons not Catholics,
was not only inexpedient, hut injurious to the cause
of Catholicity. Now, Sir, I contend that they ask
more than they ever did before, unless they place in
front of their petition the security required in ISO. But,
Sir, I shall prove that they ask more than is allowed to
catliclics in any state in Europe. And. first, in Austria.
it appears from the Report of a Committee, in 1816,
that in Austria the Catholic Bishops are appointed by
the Emperor ; in Naples, on the very threshold of
the Roman dominions no Bull of the Pope is valid
until confirmed by the royal exequatur ; in Prance
the King appoints to all vacancies, and even ll:
Spain, the strong hold of Popery, no 1301 l of the
Pbpe is valid until it has received the consent
Evenit
of e
Icing, who appoints to all ecclesiastical vacaoc•e!'
Where the Greek religion is the astablisnen faith,
as different from the Catholic al the Protestant is, and
d no r
Bishops are appointed by the Amln"'to alnie(4
rescript of the Pope's is by law alloWe published,
where the catholic Religion is only tolerated, the Catholic
until referred to the Senate, and sanctioned by the Em-
peror. In Prussia, where the larger portion of the popu,
lotion o andriist.y oufthaelriabne,raland acute the lesser Catholic, we have tha
Adams,
now Chief Magistrate of the United States, then Pleaipo.
tentiary to the Qourt a Berlin, who says that the ap-
pointment of the Catholic Bishops in Prussia rests with
the Icing of Prussia that he has declared himself Head
of all the Churches within his dominions, and the Pope
ac minded mart, nit.
Vicar-General under hira—(a laugh); and that the only

appeal from hie Majesty's,deciaio4 lies (not_ to the Pope)o
but to a Provincial Synod. Some opposition to thee
(his Majesty of Prussia's) claims to ecclesiastical pate
were at first made by a Chapter, but the Chapter was ul-
timately obliged to submit. So I say, if we should insipoo,
securities on the Catholics—that is, in case concession of
their claims shall ever be made to them—we shall finU
that the Catholics, though they may resist at first,- *ill
submit at last.--(Cheering.)—On this grounk • tben.
I must declare my opposition to • the claims of the
Catholics :—that no alteration has taken place in .the
Catholic belief; that they have not advanced one ate?
in renouncing their opinions. Nave they been.
md by the Church of Rome? If they had .been, the CS'
tholics of these kingdoms would have been.glad to publish
the fact. Then I say, that up .to this time no ecclesiasti°

cal power whatever that exercises authority over ihe
tholics, whether Pope, Bishops, or Council, has repounced
the mischievous opinions that gave rise to the restrictiY°
laws against them. Sir, Ido not allude now to men
theological opinions. God forbid, that I should ever s'4l-
- restrictions on my fellow-subjects on the ground of
those high and mysterious points of belief that form the
foundation of purely theological opinions. No, I object to
them on account of their political opinions—opinions iv
jurious to the union of the Church and State. Our an'

cestors held the union of the Church and State indispeu'
sable to the national good, or as Andrew Martin strongly
put it in his book, that the Church and State were indhe
so!ubly united, and that one of them could not stand after
the other had fallen. Now, the Catholics hold that theis
Church is exclusive; that it is the only Church ; the CV
tholic Bishop of Killala has deelared that he considers 110
Bishop out of the pale of the Catholic Church as a Bishop.
Dr. D'Anglade, Professor of Moral Philosophy in the Ca'
tholic College of Maynooth, says that if the Pope and a
Council should jointly declare the Pope infallible, it would
be the duty of the Catholics then to believe in the infalli-
bility of the Pope. Now, though the Catholics profera
not to believe the Pope infallible, may they net, in case
should concede their claims, summon a Council the nest,
day and declare the infallibility of the Pope an article As'
their faith ? When the same ' person is asked by any ce
of the Commissioners, whether, if a Catholic Council''
should declare a certain opinion to be an article of 'the-
Catholic Faith, he would believe that article, how does he'
answer ?—Not candidly—not directly—but thus, that hv
does not think it necessary to answer the question as 0
was not likely the case put could ever be realised. Nosh
is that the answer of an honest man? Sir, I say it is flot
—it is a Jesuitical evasion. Further, this witness, o°'
being interrogated on the power of the Pope to -dieptoof
with the obligations of en oath, denies that the Pope hi°,
the dispensing power, except in cases where the rights c`
superiors are concerned. Does not this acknowledgreo.
intimate that the power of the Pope, (he being a superior
to every Catholic) is one of the excepted cases. Can yon
then with safety, admit to office in the State, persons hold'
ing that opinion? But when this same witness is askeA
whether there is not, in the class-book used by the. Mar
nooth student, an opinion different from this last doctritie
laid down by him, he answers that there is in the clap
book an exception to the effect that the Pope has not the
power of allowing a man to dispense with his oath in coo.;
where the common good is concerned. But in what part 0;
the hook does the House think this exception stands;
Why, twenty pages before the place where the genera'
rule is laid down—thus, by this precedence, giving tf,
the exception the prominent appearance of a getter'
rule in the eyes of the Students. Is this mode of pre:
seeding, I ask the House, candid or honest ? I belt"
then, that this proves the Catholic religion of the Pre;
sent day to be the same as in times past, or, as one s'
their poets said of it, ‘, immortal (by the way, this' WO
rather too strong a stretch of fancy) and unchanged." Vag j
changed it certainly is. Then look at their aversion v'
the diffusion of the Scriptures. Even so lately as let
the reading of the Scriptures was denounced by one of the;
Bishops. I wish, too, to observe, that from the moment
at which the Jesuits were suppressed, the Catholics scelf,,
allowed the enjoyment of greater powers, and we 10t
therefore take the time at which the dissolution of the
order took place, as the era from which good feeling trr
wards Catholics had its commencement in this country e/_,
The House will remember, too, that it is only three
four years since the Pope thought proper to re-estnblie"
the order of Jesus, stating, in a bull he published of°
the occasion, that he had been induced to do so in cos
sequence of the daily, representations he had reveiT
from the bishops and dignitaries of the Catholic Church{
offering abundant proof of the utility and excellence
the order. It appears accordingly, from various PT/
that the spirit of the Catholic Church is unchanged, as ye
think that without following the subject further, I tit
shown enough to convince the most sceptical of this. •P",
before I .it down r wish to remark, that the titst Ot" eireu
of the securities offered by the Roman Catholics being &Or
niched from 1813 is not an auspicious sign, and that the
tone assumed by the Roman Catholics upon the pressll/
occasion, is not of that respectful nature it was went 0,,
be.—(Hear, hear.)—Their addresses and petitions are 01
written in much stronger language than they have ever bes
before.—(Hear, hear.)—And I do entreat the House tf
pause on the last general election in Ireland, and I will sa°
those Hon. Members who were present at it, whether that
extreme dominion exercised over the lower order of Roman
Catholics, by their Priests, in opposition to the duties
thel
owed to those who had invariably treated them with kilo'
aeon and consideration, and whom they had been always
the habit of regarding with the utmost respect and deference'
does not know that if the power of these Priests was 01
unlimited, it would produce a strong effect in this House
For myself, too, I must say that I do not attribute the distre:
13%
in Ireland to the causes so often alleged, and that are
under consideration. I believe, that if we give the- Irr,
peasantry education—if we encourage the diffusion o_,.ftit;
light of the Scriptures among them—if we promote MP_ ji
of industry, and so succeed in opening their understs"4
ing, we shall teach them how to deserve the benefits to
which they ask, and at last render them capable and etortli
of receiving, with proper guards, the gift they so anxioi
desire. I have now delivered my opinions fearlessly 111,.A
openly, but I trust in a manner becoming an individual 11";
humble as myself. I shall be always open to conviction, bout
so long as I conceive I have reason to retain my Pre°,
opinions, so long shall I consider myself bound to opr
this motion. ko
Mr. SPENCER PERCEVAL then rose and sP° •
from under the Gallery, iu a tone of voice that wash
re!
quently inaudible. He said, that from his early yout 114
had imbibed strong prejudices upon the subject then be
the House, and that he had been strongly illarl
opposed to ur
claims of the Roman Catholics ; but while he was r."
very young Member of that House, his mind had begu°
oy
waver, and he felt disposed to think that the fears an i
alarms that many entertained were not founded in fact. s'ijt
did then accordingly what he was convinced he sv°°,,,'
never have reason to regret. He paid that deference to t":„
opinions of others, which from their talents and emiue°`:
they deserved, and he had not the stupid presumption t"
set up his own prejudices in opposition to reason and argui
meat. Having made this statement in justification of 10°11
self, and having announced that it was his intention to fill;
port the motion of the Right lion. Baronet, he vleu
say, that lie felt more anxious to declare the ground,' °
which he did not support the question, than those I,
which he did. The fact appeared to him to be, that t'",
great question, which was the mighty and never fait
cause of disunion between parties, stood upon a 'our "ra.
principle. For what said Mr. Grattan, and my. Pr°,,
Grenville, and the other celebrated advOcates of the -of
tholic cause, but that if they thought that succes°,„
this question would endanger the Protestant Establi;
ment, they would not support it ? And what said t"
Honourable Gentlemen and Noble Lords who ranged theSi
selves on the contrary side ? Was it not that they 'oii ire
accede to the measure, if they thought it could be pow" 0
safety ? The difference between the two parties, there Wfo,
merely in judgment, and as to an untried fact. NoWsspirit which animated the Church of Role v.
a
No, decidedly not ; for he held in consfielj
himself. he did not support the question because lie
argument by which it was attempted to be '`
pro
etthliilaaattngstiehider.
that it was, contained a most mischievous illusioe. fie
lievei that the Roman Catholic Religion was a foul polls
tion of the word of God. And yet, feeling this to he tab;
b
case, he would yet advocate the question ; because, th°Z9
he did not admit that the Roman Catholic Church If
changed in principle, he yet thought she was made°
controuled by that which was around her. This ilistiec4
tion might, at present, appear immaterial, but lie was CI
vinced that it was not. Fur, if the public mind were olif
induced to think that the Chuech was Rome as rel!fie
changed, the country might feel inclined to si
jet° indifference with respect to the dagger of
justly to be apprehended from the spreading
tof
Popery; but if, on the contrary, they continued ed
persuaded that the spirit of the Romish Church reinel ee
always the same, but that it was affected by the prssetb
of a Protestant atmosphere, under which scriptural tr.e.if
and a spirit of inquiry were diffused, then would no
vigilance be still alive to keep up that pressure, so lirls
have her always in the same state of harmlessness in se
tor
she then was in England. He allowed, that if the oco'o.
porters of the Church of Rome could once sucoeed io then
vincing Abe people of England that she was altered, as
might she again stretch forth her limbs, and occuPPos
she had done before, every place with her huge bulk; of
his argument was, that though unchanged in essence'loo
was yet materiallpehanrd by the light of Protest'.

that had shone up
*mush and amply et
the. natuof the- t
(continued the Igor
foe his own good ai
use.. Hi had here
sail*rithible basis
light,antorig all nte
if rreteataritism eve
aintitthe nom„
were not at that
stance Could have
time .rohen supersti
lodgment in the wi
and individual preji
eustoni,4 holy re
of the •Catholic Ch
way npivirds, was
all appliances and
what it had conqur
think that they cot
ism, unless they su
!,incereloVe of relip
its
suffer in t)
t'B° other days to
6, Was there, /
y of. its then
himself, that there
to turn theirbe rega
done for that ni
under: consideratio
led that Ireland w
niallagues, whose
Wto awake and
pie ell the bad prit
---The *bole isl
°one of discord l;
Principled- men.
if there was any °t
their grasp, than 1):
man Catholics had
.uore Obseiyation t
~°ll,the subject of tl
all be.,prayed
the- first 'place
!•eitsctenuously in 1
in the second; that
he had done, he w
giod to the feel'
tell gave Phil', I
p it
t arr. M. FITZ(
44`orned Solicitor-
that were ealculat
110 doubt was wad(
eo had brought f
e.consideration 0
1,41 en frourthat • H
Alit the Treaty
tl
in his opinior
'lrtett"ithan-like vie
Vtiltht of :ferry)
teetned Gentlema
~'":4nethad take
of the whole
-4k141* arid Learned
Ntedi his attentiol
Pria"t4lbe, as it triu
constructios
irts_entletooo said, t 1
I —'s' of Limert
thLitY of Limer
- In-anstirc
;_„Nnrable and I
;Lilicle of that T 1
„71,'Ljoilabitants 01
4i
.ors then wide:
IJ°7 all the henef
3'4▪
14 treaty.
Mu if the Hon. a
• intended
Catholics,Cat he won
,rPoae • it .was th
,7'ta on those w
Lektable subject
elm Learned. Learned. Gent
ttatutes, •o ut
-411 Of the &eel
1114 the' opposite
tkl bY the Hon. a
thab t if the oath
4bll he Winild nal
'4otaheth was n?
amt if her enhjec'
-""if they were n
io those days
al/l/be followed b
b'et all these circa
1{ lukeeessary to di
recollected to
"bile of her speech
Pht4 to religio:
Whathe and his f
they entreated ti
tht were felt
lite fr Is
014 end
' Z 111:41.4 mass of c
W'"tt learned an
stion exceedin
2fter--it was,
ir2 connected W
kteurities the'
Ztal these 2°'
hi,7 therefore oul
tleitg, to have coal
he points f
j:med himself
E 1 that was offs
Z. Pitt had add
Nio 1791 he
ere, that he L
to
atill
11 ts
e • mitredi
touoi o
jisyyt
y snraaft
desirous(i) anitwhm
lauleteetg,be:
nd
1,4 f other course c
io'oo country.
itt4 all, the motif
y's• s likely Mr
twtta, arose from
pt Parliaments
14,444;;.tilrlittYihreeedstrufirsoen
t 1,7119 other
the first
kit'', Which
as alarming
o;let,reci thousai
11,4,.nrning the
"tl7 under tl
tltll9'4eiteed in t
iv,- at first e
tt`fe at
01
tit Were not tc
l t
to
e4t, th
aft
41 nhli 11;1;1etc eeeniyimeat.
yeirt landedtri °event
tit
have revs
to,''eing joined
)4, and on tli
d
rovi.aPetded.
.i
h this the
docu'
t h.lll was still re
tt
la then ex
• Nor tio mal ) itet clangi
otit
ane
oirenee,
tith. that state
1 .1%
, 1 the
solo, l° extingt
/IN ttrts of tl
effect o
*hick ha
lrco 10 'Touch
voo,tr. could
Ile
i • of eo.
phichn
tt Iva"
14,...
wet enlig
'"en
gl7. °f
the ev
to e (11Ir. F
;:!ordingly, In(
0"
CNA jai 1111
Nbiect, hO4 la
Our • int Our
terdueid 1 which. re: