The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1847-08-31 00:00:00

THE IRISH CHURCH.

TO THE EDITOR OF THE LIVERPOOL STANDARD.._
SIR,—In the report of the elections which have taxen.
place in the neighbourhood of London—and among the
pledges demanded from or volunteered on the part of
the candidates one unmistakeable note of unmitigated
hostility to the Irish. Church has resounded. Whatever.
may become of Corn Laws for Protectionists, or vote by
ballot for Radicals, certain it is that but one destiny alone
is in preparation for the Established Church in Ireland—
her doom is sealed, her existence suspended upon a thread
which is already severed by anticipation.
Will you then • indulge me, if not in the name of an,
antiquated and exploded Christianity, yet of that fair play
to which Englishmen still profess some attachment, and,
ere the knell of our expiring Church has tolled its last
solemn peal; and suffer one of the least worthy of her mem-
bers to address a few words of expostulation, through the
medium of your widely-circulated journal, in vindication
of our Clergy, to whom a responsibility has been intrusted
for_ the salvation of their. -fellow men, some of- whom
might indeed have flattered themselves that enough of her
treasure and even 4# her blood had by this time been
wrung from the Chuftlto satiate the vengeance of our
enemies. '
Since this is not the_case, may I implore the clemency
once conceded by the monarch of Babylon to a captive
prophet whom, together with his Hebrew companions, a
relentless decree had destined to destruction—Audi alte-
ram partem : whilst the same piea urged by Daniel, with-
out laying claim to his inspiration, is employed to disclose
the interpretation of passing events, with their inevitable
result. For the secret which the king hath demanded
cannot the wise men, the astrologers, the magicians, the
soothsayers interpret ; but there is a God in Heaven that
revealeih secrets, and maketh known what shall be in the
latter days." Suffice it then that the present period,
which is allowed on all hands to be the " fourth kingdom"
of Nebuchednezzar's vision of the image is thus repre-
sented :—" His legs of iron, his feet part of iron and part
of clay. Thou sawest till a stone was cut out without
hands which smote the image upon his feet that were of
iron and clay, and broke them to pieces. Then was the
iron, the clay, the brass, the silver, and the gold broken
to pieces together, and became like the chaff of the sum-
mer threshing floors." Make what comment you please
upon this prophecy; you can arrive at no other conclu-
sion than that the " clay" of democracy which enters ,
so largely into combination with the " iron ' of despotism
is the true cause of our national weakness and disunion.
For what real or lasting amalgamation could be expected
amid such incongruous materials—where Jewish gold is
alloyed with treasury silver, or where Jesuit iron is over-
layed with Chartist brass—all combining to constitute
a heterogeneous mass of anomalous political elements
which must explade of themselves, and are, eventually,
doomed to be dispersed at His.coming who has laid a sure
foundation whereon to erect his kingdom over all the
nations of the earth.—Your obedient servant,