deprived of the common connexions of country, rendered liable to a præmunire if he stepped five miles from his own threshold, and to the penalties of treason if he so transgressed a second time; but was it necessary to remind the House of Fawkes's plot, as a proof that treason, not faith, was the cause and the object of these terrible enactments? Terrible, as those enactments were, it must be allowed that there was some justification for them, while the safety of the state, and the succession to the throne were threatened by the conflict of the hostile religions. But with the reign of James 1st, that apology seemed to end. In the reigns subsequent to that of James 1st, was there any thing in the conduct of the Roman Catholics to induce the belief that their religion was hostile to the security of the state? In the reign of Charles 1st, was it the old religion that overturned the monarchy? Did the Roman Catholics bring that monarch to the block? Was it a papist who struck the fatal blow?

that no motive of conscience would ever lead him to attempt the overturn of the establishment of that country which had placed him in so distinguished a situation.

But in what manner did the history of England bear out the theory of his right hon. friend? What, as he had already observed, was the conduct of the Catholics of England throughout the trying struggle of the reign of Charles 1st? A continual tenor of adherence to the government amidst domestic faction and civil war, and at the risk of their property and their lives. Had they no temptation to shrink from a faithful discharge of their duty? and yet in what instance had they failed?

He had said that Catholics, though excluded by law from the House of Commons, still retained their seats in the House of Peers. What was their conduct in that House? and how was it requited? In 1641, a bill was brought in to exclude the bishops from sitting in parliament. In the House of Lords it was lost upon a division, and in the maIt had been asserted indeed, in that de- jority were to be found many Catholic bate that it was impossible for a Roman peers. Thirty years after, a bill was sent Catholic to enter into full enjoyment of up to the Lords for the exclusion of political rights, without feeling it to be Catholic peers from seats in parliament. his bounden duty to employ them in an It was passed by a great majority; and in attempt to overturn the Protestant ecclesi- that majority were included the Protestant astical establishments of the country, and bishops. He meant nothing disparaging to it had even been said, that no harm was in- the bishops of that day. Undoubttended in imputing this doctrine to the Ca-edly, they thought that they were doing tholics-that it charged them with nothing which they who made the charge would be ashamed of doing, had it been their for tune to live under an adverse ecclesiastical establishment. Now, he thought this was taking an unfair advantage. Any man who chose to throw away his own character was master of that of another; and the hon. gentlemen thought that by thus impartially accusing themselves, they acquired the right of inculpating the Catholics. He was, therefore, obliged to vindicate his right honourable friend from his own admission, in order to protect the Catholic from the inference deduced from it. He entirely disbelieved his right hon. friend's self-accusation; he was sure that if the lot of his right hon. friend had been cast in another country, of which the established religion was different from his own-and if he had there been allowed nevertheless to take his seat in the senate, and to exhibit himself, as he did at present, to the admiration of all who heard him, he was sure that no suggestion of priestcraft,

their duty. But he should like to know-supposing the Catholics to have voted for the expulsion of the bishops, as the bishops did for theirs what would now have been said of the conduct of the Catholics? Would not the House have rung with the triumphant inference that now, as in 1641, the admission of the Catholics into parliament must be the destruction of the Protestant hierarchy? The only inference he would draw was, that as one good turn deserved another, the passing of this bill would afford to the bishops of the present day an opportunity of returning the obligation of 1641.

But some gentlemen had a still more ingenious theory. For two centuries it was urged, had the Catholics been brooding patiently over their wrongs, and, like the Brutus of history, disguising, under the appearance of insensibility, the deep sense which they entertained of themthey were only waiting for the passing of this bill to wreak the vengeance which

He had hitherto spoken of the Roman Catholic religion generally, and addressed himself to its operation in England. He now came to speak more particularly of that part of the united Kingdom which was more peculiarly interested in the present question-of Ireland.

had so long been smothered in their human nature to which they might breasts. Indeed! And had this and former apply them as corrosives-laws which debates so far exhausted all reasonable counteracted all the feelings of nature objections, and all rational fears, that destroyed all the comforts of famiwe were now to be daunted from doing lies, so long as they existed; and exist what was right, by the apprehension that they did, until the 14th year of the reign the present race of Catholics would throw of George 3rd, all in full force and unoff a mask worn by successive genera- diminished vigour. By them the conformtions of their ancestors, and revenge them- ing son could seize upon the property of the selves in the first delirium of new-gotten unconforming father; by them the unfreedom, for ages of suppressed feeling, principled and heartless Protestant wife and hypocritical fidelity? Surely to believe could array herself in the riches of her bein such a danger required a more than trayed Catholic husband; by them the Roman Catholic credulity! orphan heretic might be robbed by any anti-papist plunderer of his patrimony; through their operation there was no faith in kindred, no social intercourse of friendship, no security in any of the relations of domestic life. In 1774 came the first relaxation of this accursed system, the first breathing of a mighty thaw upon that accumulated mass of cold and chilling enactments, which till then had congealed and benumbed a nation. What was the first symptom of this genial spirit? It was a symptom sufficiently indicative of the degraded state to which the Catholic had been reduced, and of the difficulty which benevolent repentance found in breaking up the frost which so long had bound him. The first relaxation, that omen of returning spring, enabled the papist, notwithstanding his belief in transubstantiation,' to rent-oh, mighty indulgence!-fifty acres of bog! This relaxation was found to succeed so well, the Protestant establishment continued so firm under the shock of it, that parliament allowed them afterwards to take a lease for 60 years. From that time the system was progressively mitigated, until the year 1792, which crowned and consummated the gift of civil liberty, and left only political concession imperfect,-imperfect in actual deed-but in principle acknowledged and anticipated.

During the earlier of the reigns which he had shortly reviewed, the Reformation, which, in England, had made such rapid strides, had not only mounted the throne, but almost monopolized the legislature, it had made no progress whatever in Ireland. And why? And whose the fault? No pains had been taken to advance it. On the contrary, to judge from facts, it was the policy of Elizabeth to keep it back. Neglect alone hardly furnished a sufficient solution of such total apathy in one kingdom, contrasted with so stirring and anxious an activity in the advancement of Protestantism in the other. But such was the fact. What wonder, then, that the rebellion in the time of Charles 1st assumed in Ireland a popish character, when the whole population were papists? What wonder if politics and religion were mixed up in a country where the Reformation never entered at all; and the reformed religion never, but in arms and as a conqueror? Such was its entry, first under Cromwell, and last under king William. The penal code against the Catholics of Ireland dated from the conquest of that kingdom by William 3rd. The popish parliament had enacted severe laws against Protestants; the Protestant parliament had retaliated most severely. No single individual would have dared to take upon himself the odium attendant on such retaliation. From that parliament ema. nated a series of laws such as had not previously existed in the records of legislation-laws the framers of which seemed to have taxed their imagination to find out the sore points of

When, in the year 1792, the elective franchise was conceded to the Catholics of Ireland, that acknowledgment and anticipation which he called upon the House that evening formally to ratifiy and realize was, in point of fact, irrevocably pronounced. To give the Catholic the elective franchise was to admit him to political power. To make him an elector, and at the same time render him incapable of being elected-was to attract to your side the lowest orders of the community at the same time that you repelled from it the highest orders of the gentry. This was not

the surest or safest way to bind Ireland" When late I attempted your pity to move, to the rest of the empire in ties of affection. What was there to prevent our union from being drawn more closely ? Was there any moral, was there any physical obstacle? Opposuit natura? No such thing. We had already bridged the channel. Ireland now sat with us in the representative assembly of the empire; and when she was allowed to come there, why was she not also al lowed to bring with her some of her Catholic children? For many years we had been erecting a mound, not to assist or improve, but to thwart nature. We had raised it high above the waters; and it had stood there frowning hostility, and effecting separation. In the course of time, however, chance and design, the necessities of man and the silent workings of nature, had conspired to break down this mighty structure,-till there remained of it only a narrow isthmus, standing

"Between two kindred seas, "Which, mounting, view'd each other from a far,

"And long'd to meet.”

What then shall be our conduct? Shall we attempt to repair the breaches, and fortify the ruins?-a hopeless and ungracious undertaking!-or shall we leave them to moulder away by time and accident? -a sure but distant, and thankless consummation! Or shall we not rather cut away at once the isthmus that remains, allow free course to the current which our artificial impediments have obstructed, and float upon the mingling waves the ark of our common constitution?

The right hon. gentleman then proceeded to reply to various detached objections which had been offered in the course of the debate by different speakers. Some gentlemen were afraid, that when the final concessions were granted, those persons who had stood by the constitution when they only enjoyed its benefits partially, would rise up against it, after being admitted to the full participation of its blessings. This was not likely. As yet the constitution was to them negative and repulsive. Then, it would be positive and full of advantage. We had frequently been assailed by the prayers of the Roman Catholics, but we had as often treated them with scorn, professing at the same time to do it for their own good. Indeed, he thought that the Catholics might address us in pretty much the same language as a certain lover had addressed his mistress

Oh; why were you deaf to my prayers? Perhaps it was right to dissemble your love But why did you kick me down stairs?" Others apprehended that they would still be discontented because all offices could not be opened to them indiscriminatelynot those, for instance, which had, by the nature, of their functions any connexion with ecclesiastical interests. Surely the With distinction was plain enough. the established religion of the country the Roman Catholics would of course have nothing to do. This must be a first and fundamental principle, both of all that was yielded and all that was retained. None but those who professed the established religion of the state could pretend to the exercise of any functions immediately connected with that religion, or with the ecclesiastical system in which it was embodied. They had already provided liberally for diffusing the benefits of education in Ireland; and God forbid that any sect of Christians should, on account of their faith, be deprived of the means of obtaining knowledge; but God forbid, he would also say at the same time, that the means of education should not, wherever it was possible, be con ferred under the auspices of our national church! The provisions of the bill excluded Roman Catholics from the universities, and from the spiritual courts. He could perceive no difficulty, no injustice, in carrying those provisions into effect, and in considering them as conditions of this final adjustment. This exclusion must undoubtedly be a perpetual, indispensable article of the new pact, which, he trusted, they were on the point of ratifying. He relied for the observance of that article on the nature of the thing itself, as well as on the millions of hands and hearts which were ready to defend it in case of an attempt to abrogate or repeal it. Such an apprehension therefore could afford no legitimate ground for refusing to share with our fellow-subjects the blessings which we enjoyed. Nor could he join in the opinion that the passing of this bill would divorce the union of the national church and state. He could not think that the Crown would be desecrated and the monarchy rendered unholy, any more than insecure; when every Christian creed should be admitted to the franchises of the constitution, and when thanksgivings for a community of benefits

com

were breathed alike in every diversity of Christian prayer.

ant blood-a peace which, notwithstanding the threatening aspect of affairs in some quarters of Europe, he hoped and believed was destined to be permanent. But it became us, with a view to political contingencies, to fortify ourselves by adopting all those means of

hands; and never did a more auspicious period occur for such a purpose. How beneficial to extinguish a question that never could be discussed without agitating large classes of the community How desirable to avoid the inconvenience which must follow the loss of that question at this time-its revival from year to year with increasing and more hopeless agitation! How delightful to convert the murmur of national discontent into the voice of na tional gratitude! The expression of na tional gratitude was not always conveyed by the proud column or the triumphal arch; but let this grand effort of legislation be consummated, and he had not the shadow of a doubt, but that the sentiment would be effectually inspired and unequi vocally displayed. It was indifferent to him, provided the result was concord, on which side the work of conciliation began. He cared not whether the boon was plucked from Protestant acknowledgment, by the patience, the long suffering, and the sup plications of the Catholic; or was ten. dered in generous confidence, as a voluntary gift. It would, in either case, like

He next adverted to the fears which had been expressed of a combination of Roman Catholic members of parliament to carry points favourable to their separate interests and persuasion. First the number of members that would be re-strength which were offered to our turned from Ireland-how infinitely small would it be in comparison with the whole representation? But let them for a moment suppose the case of any considerable number of these much-dreaded Catholics possessing seats in that House what was it that they could combine to accomplish or to repeal? What objects could they have in view? They must necessarily be objects of private or local interest; for with regard to political designs with regard to all that appertained to the advancement of their faith or spiritual interests-suspicion was alive, and the attempt must be defeated as soon as it was made. Such a combination, if directed to general purposes, must be as notorious as the sun at noon, and must be defeated as soon as known. Others again, dreaded not the operation of numbers, but the danger to arise from the return of demagogues to parliament. He should only answer that in parliament he wished to see them. He had never known a demagogue who, when elected to a seat in that House, did not in the course of six months shrink to his proper dimensions. In the event of a parliamentary reform, it would the gentle dew from Heaven," bless both be his wish to see a little nest of bo- the giver and the receiver-resembling roughs reserved for their separate use, those silent operations of nature which and he should not be alarmed at their in-pervade and vivify the universe, receiving troduction, even although they had been qualified in palace-yard. "Here," he would say, "let the demagogue appear; and let him do his worst."

and repaying mutual benefits, whether they rose in the grateful exhalation, or de scended in the fertilizing shower. To conclude, he conjured the House to adopt a measure, from which he entertained a conviction approaching to prescience, that far from having cause to repent of its result, they would long reap a tich harvest of national strength, and happiness, and renown.-[The right hon. gentleman sat down amidst fervent and general cheer

To return, however, to the main ques tion. He was aware that he had exercised too long the patience of the House: he felt the importance of the subject most deeply: he was convinced that this bill, or (as he did not mean to affirm that it was perfect of its kind,) a bill of this nature was necessary, and was most ex-ing.] pedient at the present season. moment was peculiarly favourable for discussion, and singularly free from any hazard with which the measure might otherwise be attended. We were now in the enjoyment of a peace achieved by the common efforts of both religions, by Catholic as well as Protestant arms, and cemented by Catholic as well as ProtestVOL. IV.

The The question being put," That the bill be now read a second time," the House divided:

Ayes
Noes

Majority......

The bill was then read a second time; and at half after three in the morning, the House adjourned. 4. P