The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1848-12-19 00:00:00

south and west of Ireland to England. or in tranquillising
those districts in themselves. The priests would take the
Saxon money, and act the Celt just as before. The grace
of the grant could not be damaged by the insulting con-
dition of the subsequent good behaviour of the recipient;
and if it be supposed that gratitude for a free and una-
lienable gift would attach the priests to the government,
I venture to suggest that an attachment to their own
system in which they have been brought up, and the
operation of which is to invest them with more than hu-
man importance and dignity in the eyes of their fellows,
will prove stronger than any new-born attachment pur-
chased by .£2OO or £3OO a-year. Endow Romanism in
Ireland to-morrow, and you will still have there—nay,
you will have strengthened and consolidated there—a
church which, as has been well and truly observed in the
London Standard of last Monday—
" Delegates the power of the Deity to man—which proclaims
itself exclusive and infallible—which grants indulgence to sin,
and guarantees salvation, and both for money—which surren-
ders reason to the priest, and shuts up revelation from the
paople—which substitutes the sens s for the understanding—
which trades in miracles, and sells impunity, and discounts
transgression—which consecrates human merits and human
hopes and man made idols, and gives its sinful populace of
saints a Gospel mediation 1 Is this a fiction? We appeal to
Ireland. That Ireland in which Rome loudly boasts a pure
unbroken hierarchy from St. Peter. Was earth ever before
defiled with more living pollution in the shape of man? See
wnat priestcraft does ! But they pray. Yes, through beads !
But they hear prayers. Yes, in Latin. But they have the
Bible. They have not, and if they had, they could not read it,
and if they could, they dare not I (Cheers.) But they have
their chapels. And what have been the lessons from the altar?
The truth is, they have the church in place of the gospel. And
that church, what with its saints days and holidays, its confes-
sional tyranny, its vendible indulgencies, its mock miracles
its exclusive salvation, its assumed infallibility, its dispensing
power, and all the mammery of song and paint, and images
and relics, the working tools of priestcraft, have made them
what they are—a filthy, idle, lazy, ignorant, importunate, and
restless compound of mendicancy and treason. (Hear, hear.)
This is the seventeen century work of Rome Papal in Ireland.
Does any man doubt this? Let him visit the "green island.'
This is Romanism in the nineteenth century ! Still the
question remains, what can be done for Ireland ? First,
make burning a Bible, or insulting or molesting a
preacher or teacher of the Bible, felony ; and let any man
who is guilty of the foul offence, whether priest or pea-
sant, be transported or incarcerated, without favour or
partiality. (Loud cheers.) Secondly, establish, endow,
and protect, an efficient Christian mission, for the con-
version of the idolators of the south and west. Let sta-
tiops fnr_missionary preaching be appointed by authority,
and punish instantly and severely any man who attempts
by any violence to prevent any other man from attending.
Thirdly, let an act of Parliament be passed, declaring
that no man who professes any allegiance. spiritual or
temporal, to any foreign potentate, prince or prelate,
shall be eligible to serve on juries in any part of the
United Kingdom. (Hear, hear.) Let Great Britain
shew herself Protestant in good earnest, and Protestant
boldness will assuredly be crowned with Protestant suc-
cess. Let Popery be thought of and spoken of, as a thing
to be got rid of—a darkness to be dispelled by the light of
the Gospel—and not as a branch, though a corrupt one,
of Christ's Church, to be preserved in secula seczdorum.
I am happy to see the rise and progress of movements in
the right direction. Only this day I find in a London
newspaper a letter from an Irish clergyman, the Rev. W.
Digby, containing this announcement—

`The diocese to which the writer belongs is actually taking
measures to recommence forthwith an aggressive missionary
movement more systematically and comprehensively than ever
in order to rescue our countrymen `out of the hands of those
who have served themselves of them,' and to make ready a
people prepared for the Lord.' Some of our friends in England
have proffered to us their personal help in this matter. But we
deem that we ought to be fitter in our place according to our
bounden duty, for the work that is to be done ourselves than
any strangers, however able or zealous they might be. And
when we have first raised the standard from our church towers
and nailed it to the mast—' No PEACE WITH ROME,' we can,
then, with a better grace and more effect, accept of, or even
solicit the help of our brethren from without. But we. begga-
red as we are, shall want money from our English friends to
work the press, and, above all, we shall want their prayers."
The Gospel, and nothing but the Gospel, can meet and
supply the real wants of Ireland.

" Concerning all the secular efforts of Great Britain on be-
half of Ireland during the last half century, it is only necessary
to say, that while they have supplied themes for interminible
controversy, both in and out of parliament, their practical fail-
ure is notorious to a proverb. In vain has a conciliating go-
vernment and a compliant legislature passed every measure
that could add to the political influence of Roman Catholics.
In vain have political privileges, national and municipal, been
followed by poor las a for their relief, and large grants of public
money for their employment. In vain has the legal property
of the Established Church been reduced one-fourth, and the
remainder changed from a tythe payable by the occupier, into
a rent charge payable by the owner of the land. (It should be
remembered that while in three provinces the occupiers are
chiefly Roman Catholics all over the kingdom the owners are
chiefly Protestants.) In vain has the national education of the
country been unchristianised to meet the prejudices of Roman
Catholic priests ; and a national endowment made and consoli-
dated for the more enlarged support and instruction of those
priests. In vain are facilities given for the sale of encumbered
estates, and laws devised to fetter or coerce landlords in their
bargains and arrangements with their tenants. All in vain.
For now, after all, wherever Romanism prevails, the due ad-
ministration of British law is impracticable, and disaffection
and disorder, tumult and crime, are the characteristics of
the district : whereas, on the other side, as if to leave no excuse
to the inquirer, wherever Protestantism prevails, law is para-
mount as in Great Britain, and the government can dispense
with military intimidation, the people themselves being the
champions and defenders of loyalty and order, industry and
peace. Of an army of occupation now amounting to forty thou-
sand men, only two regiments are in the large and populous
province of Ulster. And why so ? Because of the two millions
and a half of Protestants in Ireland, nearly two millions are in
the province of Ulster. Facts themselves can make nothing
clearer than this—that Romanism is the bane of the United
Kingdom, localIZ:In its social aril:Moral mischiefs, and nation.
ally, in the prodigious expense thereby incurred. On these
grounds, independent of the still higher considerations which
ought to actuate Christians for the everlasting welfare of their
fellow-men, we deem it the obvious, urgent, imperative duty of
the Christian churches in Great Britain and Ireland, to make
conscience of a decided and determined effort for the conver-
sion of the Roman Catholic population. There is nothing chi-
merical in such an attempt. To think so would be to harbour
an unworthy want of confidence in our divine religion. What
the glorious gospel has accomplished in England and Scotland,
it can accomplish in Ireland also, if zealously and prayerfully
administered. Already, from conspiring coincidences, political
and social, and by the operations of the Irish Society, a great
and effectual good is opened; and although there are many ad-
versaries,_ yet an unprecedented willingness exists amongst the
Roman Catholic people to give ear to the Word of God, if read
or spoken to them in their native language."

The crisis is favourable. The head of the Papal system,
supposed to have been infallible, has made a great mis-
take. (Cheers and laughter.) He promised last year
what he was unable to perform, and now he is dethroned
and a fugitive. The existing vovernment at Rome has
pronounced a rescript of his Holiness to be of no value,
and continues its proceedings in defiance of the impotent
man. His rescript in condemnation of the Irish colleges
founded by our Government, has in like manner been treated
as a document of no value. All things are conspiring to
deliver men's minds from the prostration and thraldom
of this overgrown superstition. But political events
however they may open favourable opportunities for the
advancement of the gospel, are not to be depended upon
in themselves for any permanent and useful change in
men's minds. (Hear, hear.) We must bring the
light of truth to shine into the dark den of the
man of sin. And truly he provokes the contrast.
Even now he proclaims to the world the astound-
ing blasphemy against the cross of Christ, that his
present misfortunes are endured to make an atonement
for his sins and the sins of his people. But I must now
release you from this long address. It is said of us,
" Why have meetings of this kind at all ?—why say
things that create prejudice or irritation in the minds of
Roman Catholics ? ' I should like to answer this ques-
tion by asking another. Why should public agitation be
all on one side ? (Hear, hear.) Why should the advo-
cates of conciliation-the advocates of treating all creeds
alike as equally beneficial in a national point of view—
why should they have it all to themselves? (Hear.)
Why should it be commendable zeal in them to propa-
gate their principles, and narrow-minded bigotry in us to
propagate ours ? I ask you—as Cobbett used to call you
—the honest, thinking people of England—why should
they have it all on their side ? (Hear, hear.) You
have something in the Mercury from week to week
opposed to our principles : why not have something in
the Standard, in accordance with them ? (Cheers.)
We don't object to their meetings—we don't cry them
down, and say, " Look at those bigots—they had a fine
soiree last night." (Cheers.) I think we owe something
to our poor Protestant people as well as to Roman Catho-
lics. We must take means to have a tone of Protestant
feeling in England ; and if those in high places will not
listen, those in low places must. (Hear.) We say I
nothing and think nothing unkindly of them, and why
should they so think of us? (Applause.) I should like
to have these questions answered fairly in the liberal
papers, as they are called. I don't say that with any
unkindness towards them. It makes people think, and
the more we think the less Popery we shall have. (Cheers.)
But still there is a duty due to Protestants—to inculcate
hatred to all falsehood, by whomsoever told, which is
opposed to the revelation of our Lord Jesus Christ, and I
believe that properly administered it may be done with-
out any indecorum or violence to the Sabbath from
the pulpit, and must be maintained from the pulpit.
The Reformation was won by the pulpit. (Loud
cheers.) But at that time the people did not read near
so much as they do now, and as I would not have the
reporters to break the Sabbath by reporting what we say
from the pulpit, I think we ought to come sometimes to
meetings like this, and say things that will get into the
newspapers, and so give a tone to our countrymen. That
tone should be maintained—the tone that sustained the
labours, day and night, of Wickliff whilst he toiled in
the translation of the Word of God into the English
language—the tone that fortified the voice and heart of
Lord Cobham when he stood in Westminster Hall,
and addressing his judges, said—" My Lords, these right
rev. gentiemen, so long as they knew me addicted to blas-
phemy and debauchery, never issued any summons—never
addressed to me any remonstrance, but so soon as they
knew I was reading and translating the word of God by
Wickliff, they have brought me here to be unjustly con-
demned by this tribunal." The tone that sustained La.
Cranmer, Ridley, Hooper, and others, who, amid
burning fagots, would call out—" None but Christ, none
but Christ." The tone that sounded most royally in the
Queen's English, when Elizabeth said—" Let no Popish
Legate come nearer England than Brussels." The tone
calmly, but firmly, uttered by the seven Bishops who
preferred the Tower to any compromise of their Protes-
tant principles—the tone thundered through the kingdom
on the acquittal of those Bishops—the tone that, recog-
nising a desperate necessity for change, yet retaining a
high principle of legitimacy as far as the higher interests
of true religion would permit, invited the Prince of
Orange, excluded the Stuarts, and established the house
of Brunswick—(cheers)--the tone, finally, that was re-
echoed with emphasis, on the day of her coronation,
by our gracious Sovereign Lady, Queen Victoria. (Loud
and continued cheers.)
The Rev. F. PARRY rose to move the first resolution,
and was received with loud cheers. He was happy in
again having the privilege of attending a meeting of the
Protestant Association, for their opponents had been ready