INTRODUCTION. THE principles of parliamentary reform had gained considerable ground in Ireland previous to the year 1790; but their proselytes, to a great extent, had been amongst the aristocratic portion of society, and there were but few men who were enlightened enough to combine with a demand for parliamentary reform, that other equally necessary measure, the removal of Catholic disability. Parliamentary reform was a Whig measure, and the Whigs of Ireland had not made up their minds that its blessings should go beyond the pale of their own sect. The Northern Whig Club, founded under the fatal auspices of Lord Charlemont, partook of the character of its patron, and amongst its numbers were men distinguished, but a few years after its dissolution, for principles and conduct alike destructive to civil and religious freedom, and to national independence. It was founded in Belfast in March, 1790. Its career was brief and useless. A society, whose existence was pregnant with the most important events, which, before its destruction, involved in its body a considerable portion of the people, and threatened the existence of English power in Ireland, followed in order of time the Northern Whig Club. It occurred to a few young and bold spirits-found in the middle ranks of life in Belfast, and chiefly Presbyterians—that the great defect in the previous movements for a redress of political grievances was the sectarian bigotry which excluded the Catholics from any participation in the blessings of reform. The young men of Belfast judged justly, that the hope of obtaining a full B |