The Sun.
London, England, 1845-05-22 00:00:00

perience, added to the example presented them in Russia
—he cestinued in the same opinion ; he would ask him,
were his fears all abandoned—was his alarm mitigated ?
And he felt curious to know, would the man who told
them, in 1838, that his fears were justified, tell
them, in 1845, that those fears were ground-
less, unworthy, and fanatical ?—(Loud cheers.)
If it was desired to govern Ireland wisely and well, this
result could not be accomplished by putting the reins of
Government into the hands of Irish bishops and aßoman
Catholic hierarchy. This plan had been pursued in
France, but what had been the consequences ? Why,
the Government had been shaken to its centre, and anar-
chy, confusion, and bloodshed had been the result.—
(near, hear.) And this, probably, might be the un-
happy effects in Great Britain. Religious peace and pri-
viregee were not to be scorned, and he would appeal to
his Right Hon. Friend the Secretary of State whether
these things were to be obtained by the policy now pur-
sued towards Ireland. His Right Hon. Friend wished
to allay the agitation in Ireland, but, he would ask, was
the present measure the best means to do so ? When
the measure for Maynooth was originally proposed, the
agitation in Ireland was nearly quieted. The receipts in
the Conciliation Hall had been diminished, and the
monster meetings had ilearly ceased. He would tell
the Government that the moment the announcement
of the proposed measure had reached the Irish shore,
agitation bad been re-commenced. The consequences
were, that assemblies had been held, of so portentous a
character, that a question was asked by an Honourable
Member the other night to know what was the meaning
of these meetings. He would inquire, was it intended
to make the Roman Catholic priesthood amenable to the
law, or was it intended to render the law subject to the
hierarchy ? Was the law to be placed under the domi-
nation of any body of ecclesiastics of any class ? He
should be told that this state of things was foreign to the
first principles of the Constitution. It was well ; but he
would say that the priesthood of Ireland were to be
Ibund the filmiest and most unflinching friends and ad-
vocates of repeal, and, therefore, no peace could be had
with the Roman Catholic hierarchy, for it was pledged
th agitation, and to such was the government of Ireland
to be delivered. To this course he felt sure the Right
Hon. Baronet the Secretary for Ireland would object.
The caves he had quoted from at a former period, re-
gatiding the conversion of Roman Catholics to Pro-
testantism, would give no peace to Ireland, even
if all its inhabitants were changed from their original
belief. He would refer the House to the report that had
been made, and if they recurred to the trial at Tralee,
they would find his statements confirmed is every parti-
cular, as to the part taken by the Catholic priests in
suborning witnesses, to make a pretended declaration of
faith in the Protestant religion. From a report, also,
which had been made by a Committee of the House in
1835, it would be found that Roman Catholic priests had
on many occasions instigated and persuaded the ignorant
peasantry to take part in opposing the just and legal
claims which their landlords had on them. The Hon.
Baronet might disapprove of these statements, but he
could not controvert them. And again, in 1839, he had
heard of a man who had been condemned by the magis-
tracy, but because he had served the priesthood, they
had stepped forward unanimously as a body to protect
the criminal from the sentence so richly deserved, and to
snatch the just victim of the law from the hands
of justice. There was another circumstance, too, in
Ireland, which would not be tolerated in scarcely
arty other country on the face of the earth. A priest
there might denounce a man from the altar. He would
inquire was it not inconsistent with the liberty of the
subject, and contrary to the law, that any person should
be publicly. exposed, and held up to party vengeance at
the mere whim of a Popish priest?—(Hear, hear.) The
Hon. Member then read a statement from a paper which
he held in his hand of a case of prosecution in which
the plaintiff had been denounced by the priest, and on
the same evening that the curse was uttered the unfor-
tunate victim was murdered. lie would ask the ques-
tion then whether any ecclesiastic was authorised
by his religion to denounce any man? He was quite sa-
tisfied that no Ministry could ever succeed in governing
Ireland ley means of the priests. He would ask
whether the College of Maynooth had ever produced,
during the fifty years it had been established, any per-
son, who, by his learning and attainments, had added
anything to the literature of the country? With the
exception of Dr. WI-late and Dr. Higgins, who were
both great writers in newspapers, and in the habit of
inlminating in broad sheets their peculiar opinions, he
believed Maynooth had never produced any literary
character of any note. It was a blunder to sup-
pose the Irish people would be satisfied with
the large endowment of Maynooth, and that the agita-
tion regnant in the sister country could be calmed by it.
To suppose so was contrary to reason and common
sense. The Right Hon. Baronet at the head of the Go-
vernment, by insisting on the measure, had split his
party into pieces, had caused confusion and jealousy
amongst those who were before united, and had driven
from his side his firmest friends, to enjoy, for a brief
season, a victory gained over his former supporters and
earliest associates.
Mr. MACKENZIE then rose, and said he would
trespass on the attention of the House for only a very
few minutes. He had not been understood in an expla-
nation he had lately given in another place on the
matter of the Maynooth question. He spoke at Peebles,
before people who had great confidence in his honour,
but his speech had been misrepresented. What he said
was, that the small grant to Maynooth had done mis-
chief, and that he would support the large grant as an
experiment. He further recommended the people of
Ireland on that occasion to cherish the Union as the
people of Scotland had done, to repudiate agitation, and
to devote themselves to the cultivation of the land. This
was a slight sketch of his speech at Peebles, and such
were still his opinions.
Mr. WYSE thought the tenor of the speech of the
Hon. Gentleman the Member for Newcastle was far from
being satisfactory, and was much more likely to excite than
to al lay agitation in Ireland. He did not recognise either in
the number of the petitions, or of the signatures, what
might be termed the universal will of the people of Eng-
land, or anything approaching to it. Every mode had
been resorted to to inflame the public mind on this ques-
tion, and he would ask those who boasted of a million of
signatures, why they had not paid the same attention to
petitions signed by 800,000 of the Irish people for revi-
sion into the State trials ?—(Hear, hear.) The peti-
tioners might be classed under three heads—those who
thought it a misapplication of the public money upon
financial considerations--those who were opposed to en-
dowment—and those who opposed it on religious
grounds. He thought the financial argument so weak
that it could not be entertained by any sensible man.—
(The lion. Member read an extract from a petition
which prayed against the grant on this ground.) If the
English people objected to the grant because it was applied
to exclusively Irish purposes, he would answer them by
saving that Ireland contributed in return towards the
support of English and Scotch establishments. It
should be recollected that at the time of the union the
debt of England was 400,000,0001., whilst the debt of
Ireland was only 23,000,0001., and taxation upon Ireland
had increased in proportion, as was admitted by a
Committee of that House. Then as regarded the Pro-
testant Church, was there not ample evidence to show
that immense sums were devoted to the maintenance of
the Protestant Church, even in Catholic districts. The
Commissioners of Public Instruction in Ireland had re-
ported
that out of 2,000 parishes of which Ireland was
,
composed, 217 of them did not contain a single Protes-
tant, and yet a Protestant rector and a Protestant church
were supported in them. Another, return showed that
in 1776 the Roman Catholic populatas 1,300
0,00;
the Episcopalian, 545,000. In 1834 the C ion was 1,300,000;
the EpiscoPalianl 545,000. In 1834 the Catholic popu-
lation was more than 7,000,000, whilst there were only
752,000 Episcopalians. The Catholic landed proprietors
were obliged tot, contribute towards the support of
the Protestant Church as welt as their own, and the
expense of maintaining the Catholic clergy was very
large, thus the Irish people were obliged to support two
Churches. There were 2,000 parish priests, 1,128
curates, besides the bishops, whom the Catholics paid.
At the time Maynooth was founded there were no less
than twenty-seven professors, and 278 Irish students in
the colleges of France, Spain, Portugal, and Italy. He
was not prepared to say, either there or elsewhere, that
the Catholic Church in Ireland would be prepared to
take upon it any alliance with the State if any restric-
tion were to be put on its discipline. If the Catholic
Church were to be endowed, he did not see why the
monastic institution; should not be endowed also. But
this grant was entirely different in character from any
hic h involved the tenets of the Catholic Church. The
grant when once out of their hands would be beyond
their reach. Its object was to elevate the Roman
Catholic clergy in the country. He believed that there
was no opposition to this object, but it was opposed
because it was likely to promote the tenets of the Ca-
tholic Church. Yet when the Regium Donunz was given
to the Presbyterians, and when any gift was to be made
to the Dissenters, no mention was made of the tenets of
the party on whom the gift was bestowed, and it was
only when the Roman Catholic Church was in question
that any fear was entertained, or any obloquy was
thrown out. And this brought him to the third point of
his observations. Many petitions had been pre-
sented in that House, in which the Catholic Church had
been charged with all sorts of evils. Why this was
going back to the days of Lord George Gordon, when all
the virulence of sectarian zeal was let forth, in order to
crush the freedom of religious opinion. The Roman
Catholic religion had been charged with the abomina-
tions of anti-Christ, but he should like to know when
anti-Christ lived and when he died. He would beg
them to remember that the Catholics were Christians,
and he should wish them to remember that many princi-
ples were entertained in common, and if the Catholic
religion was false, how was it that it had lived so long ?
The charge of persecution had been thrown out, but he
might retort it on those by whom it had been applied.
By far the better plan would be to sink all differences,
and to avoid those disputes which plucked out of the
(19spel the bright gem of charity, and tended to divide
'non from each other, and to excite those points of dif-
*rence and division which was opposed to every in-
terest of humanity. We should hear no more of these
charges. Many extracts had been made from the pas-
sages of certain books of the Catholics, and an attempt
was made to fix upon them certain principles which
they could not acknowledge. In a speech of his on a
former occasion, he had made quotations from the books
of the Protestants to show their equally objectionable
sentiments. Ho bad done this with no view to recrimi-
nation—with no object to throw a false colour on the
character of their opponents. In doing this he had
been accused of uttering ds
wor which were not in
Luther's works, but such was not the case. He had
acted honestly, tend he did not ascribe any false prima-
ries to the Protestants, because he believed that any
isolated peesages should give a colour to a whole creed.
An attempt had been made to attach to the it
o.moaun..C.ae-
tholic priests an imputation of sedition ; but sh _id
cbe
recollected that many of these priests were ins o allian
'with the English State. If there was any dition, it
was to be ascribed to their own system and its laws, and
was occasioned by the principle adopted in 1688. The
Catholics bad, it was true, acted with energy of late