no further at present, and that the peti- | Christian dispensation, and the labours of tion should be read. special attention; finally, the Petitioners, who in forming their opinions have been guided by the light of experience, and an intimate knowledge of the dispositions and character of the Irish people, most the sacred ministry are counteracted by The Petition was then read. It pur- the existing state of the laws, the divine ported to be the Petition of the Roman ordinance commanding men to love each Catholic Bishops in Ireland; setting forth, other as brethren, and prescribing to every "That the Petitioners are the spiritual person to do to his neighbour as he pastors of a large portion of his Majesty's would that his neighbour should do unto Irish subjects, and suffer with them under him, is in that part of the United Kingthe pressure of those penal laws which dom greatly and grievously violated, and still aggrieve the entire body of Roman it is feared will continue to be disobeyed Catholics within these realms; that the so long as the laws inflict penalties where Petitioners, instructed by the example of there is no moral offence, nor will the their predecessors, would await patiently voice of the sacred ministry, preaching and in silence the operation of the wis- peace and good will on earth, be duly atdom of the House in repealing entirely the tended to, until the passions which those remnant of the penal code, were they not laws excite are entirely appeased, until excited at the present time by the most then the Petitioners apprehend that reliurgent motives, to pray the attention of gion, as at present, will be appealed to the House to the state of Ireland; that in Ireland, to justify division, to hallow the Petitioners presume to represent most strife, and to irritate, or render incurable respectfully to the House, that whole those wounds which it should only be classes of his Majesty's Irish Catholic sub-employed to heal; these are evils which, jects have increased, and are daily increas- may it please the House, are daily preing in knowledge, in industry, and in sented to the view of the Petitioners, and wealth, and that a feeling of discontent, to which they entreat them, as the guarwhich even a partial exclusion, when un-dians of public morality, to direct their merited, from the pale of the constitution, naturally produces, is gradually gaining strength in their minds; that this discontent, as the Petitioners humbly conceive, tends strongly to diminish that respect which a Christian people should en-respectfully, but most confidently, assure tertain for those who are placed in authority over them, and also gradually to weaken those ties by which harmony is preserved, and happiness promoted in every well-ordered community; the Petitioners beg also to state, that a portion of the people of Ireland who are raised by the law above their fellow-subjects, have exercised their privileges without due moderation, making heavy the burthens, or wounding the feelings of their suffering countrymen; the dispositions of mind which thus prevail upon the one side, by conflicting with those which are excited on the other, produce collision, and hence the relations of civil life are troubled, natural kindness is interrupted in its course, the sources of charity are dried up or perverted, and scenes without a parallel in any other nation are daily and hourly exhibited to every observer, whether foreign or domestic, of Petitioners' unhappy country; but the Petitioners, as ministers of religion, are especially impelled to present their earnest prayer to the House on behalf of Ireland, because in Ireland the blessings of the the House that, whilst the existing disabilities affecting Roman Catholics continue, whilst one part of his Majesty's subjects is depressed, and another exalted by the law, without reference to talents, to knowledge, to art, to industry, to property, or to public services, no acts of legislation, of whatever kind, can remove the real and efficient causes of those evils which afflict Ireland, nor produce any essential or permanent improvement in her at present depressed and distracted condition; the Petitioners are deeply interested in the peace and happiness of Ireland, their fidelity to the constitution, and obedience to the laws, have been long tried, they are devoted to their King and Country by the strongest attachment, and bound in their allegiance by the most awful and solemn ties; they continue to fulfil the duties of loyal subjects; they have, on several occasions, and in the most express, formal, and authentic, shape, and, as they hope, satisfactorily, explained such portion of their religious doctrines as were most frequently misunderstood by their fellow subjects; they have disclaimed anew all 6 those ambitious views, all those anti-social soever; and that they do not believe that and disloyal opinions which have so often the Pope of Rome, or any other foreign. and so gratuitously been imputed to them, prince, prelate, state, or potentate hath, or and for this purpose have within the last ought to have, any temporal or civil jurisyear adopted, approved, and published a diction, power, superiority, or pre-emideclaration, to a portion of which here nence, directly or indirectly, within this following, they earnestly solicit the atten- realm; they therefore further solemnly, tion of the House: No actual sin can in the presence of God, profess, testify, be forgiven at the will of any Pope, or and declare, that they make this Declaraany priest, or of any person whatsoever, tion, and every part thereof, in the plain without a sincere sorrow for having of- and ordinary sense of the words of their fended God, and a firm resolution to oath, without any evasion, equivocation, avoid future guilt, and to atone for past or mental reservation whatsoever, and transgressions; any person who receives without any dispensation already granted absolution without these necessary condi- by the Pope, or any authority of the See of tions, far from obtaining the remission of Rome, or any person whatsoever, and his sins, incurs the additional guilt of vio- without thinking that they are or can be lating a sacrament;' the Catholics of acquitted before God or man, or absolved Ireland not only do not believe, but they of this declaration or any part thereof, declare upon oath, that they detest as un- although the Pope, or any persons, or auchristian and impious, the belief, that it thority whatsoever, shall dispense with or is lawful to murder or to destroy any per- annul the same, or declare that it was null son or persons whatsoever, for or under the and void, from the beginning;' After this pretence of their being heretics,' and also full, explicit, and sworn Declaration, the the principle that no faith is to be kept Petitioners are utterly at a loss to conwith heretics; they further declare on ceive on what possible ground they could oath their belief that no act in itself unjust, be justly charged with bearing towards immoral, or wicked, can ever be justified our most gracious Sovereign only a dior excused, by or under pretence or vided allegiance; the Catholics of Irecolour that it was done either for the land, far from claiming any right or title good of the Church, or in obedience to to forfeited lands, resulting from any right, any ecclesiastical power whatsoever; that title, or interest which their ancestors may it is not an article of the Catholic faith, have had therein, declare upon oath, that neither are they thereby required to be- they will defend to the utmost of their lieve, that the Pope is infallible,' and power, the settlement and arrangement of that they do not hold themselves bound to property in this country as established by obey any order in its own nature immoral, the laws now in being;' they also disthough the Pope, or any ecclesiastical claim, disavow, and solemnly abjure any power, should issue or direct such an intention to subvert the present Church order, but on the contrary, that it would Establishment, for the purpose of substibe sinful in them to pay any respect or tuting a Catholic Establishment in its obedience thereto;' the Catholics of Ire- stead; and further they swear, that they land swear that they will be faithful, and will not exercise any privilege to which bear true allegiance to our Most Gracious they are, or may be entitled, to disturb Sovereign Lord King George the Fourth; and weaken the Protestant Religion and that they will maintain, support, and de- Protestant government in Ireland, whilst fend, to the utmost of their power, the the petitioners have, in the foregoing desuccession of the Crown in his Majesty's claration, endeavoured to state in the simfamily, against any person or persons plicity of truth, such doctrines of their whatsoever, utterly renouncing and ab- Church as are most frequently misunderjuring any obedience or allegiance to any stood or misrepresented amongst their other person claiming or pretending a fellow-subjects, to the great detriment of right to the Crown of these realms; that the public welfare and of Christian chathey renounce, reject, and abjure, the opi- rity, and whilst the Petitioners have nion that princes excommunicated by the disclaimed anew those errors or wicked Pope and Council, or by any authority principles which have been imputed to of the See of Rome, or by any authority Catholics, they also avail themselves of the whatsoever, may be deposed or murdered present occasion, to express their readiby their subjects, or by any person what-ness at all times to give, when required by VOL. XVI. 2 D afterwards withdrawn that oath when the power of the Pope was opposed to that of the monarch whom they had sworn to obey and to serve. In the reign of James the 1st, particularly, the oath of allegiance was tendered to the Roman Catholic priests, just after the discovery of the Gunpowder Plot. All the Catholic prelates, and even the Pope's legate in this country, took the oath, and it was then sent to Rome to receive the sanction of the Pope; but, as it was found that the oath denied the Pope's power of deposing kings, it was sent back again; the persons who had agreed to take the oath were ordered to recant, which they did; and the oath of allegiance was never taken. This fact ought to be recollected as often as the House was called upon to legislate for the Catholics. In the year 1808, to take a more recent instance, a declaration was signed by four metropolitan, and six other bishops, consenting that the king should have the power of giving a veto in the the competent authority, authentic and true information upon all subjects connected with the doctrine and discipline of their Church, and to deprecate the injustice of having their faith and principles judged of by reports made of them by persons, either avowedly ignorant of, or but imperfectly acquainted with, the nature of their Church Government, its doctrines, laws, usages, and discipline;' the Petitioners, referring not alone to the sentiments and doctrines here professed or disclaimed, but also to the tenor of their lives as well as to that of their predecessors, the Prelates of the Roman Catholic Church in Ireland, are unable to discover any cause on their own part, or in the doctrines of the Church to which they belong, on account of which, the wall of separation which still divides the inhabitants of the same country should not be taken down, and the interests and affections of all his Majesty's subjects knit indissolubly together; the Petitioners make this their most earnest and respect-election of their bishops. This declaraful appeal to the House on their own behalf, and on behalf of their fellow subjects of every religious denomination, whose interests are best promoted by being combined, but above all on behalf of their King and Country, that his Majesty may be enabled to act as the father of all his people, and the peace and happiness of his kingdom be reckoned permanent and secure; May it therefore please the House to concur in repealing those laws, which continue to aggrieve the Roman Catholics of the United Kingdom." Mr. George Dawson said, that although he had no wish unnecessarily to lengthen the discussion, he was induced to make a few observations, in consequence of the importance which the Attorney-general for Ireland had conferred upon the petition by having it read at length. There could be no question that it would form an important feature in the debate which was fixed for Monday, and he was therefore desirous that its tendency and merits should be fully understood. The petitioners stated, that the surety which they offered for their good intentions ought to be received; but never yet had any means been discovered, by which the allegiance of the Roman Catholic priesthood could be bound. There were numerous instances on record, in which the Roman Catholic clergy had proffered an oath to confirm the allegiance which they professed, and had tion received the sanction of a great number of Catholics and their friends. Dr. Milner, their champion and advocate, lord Grenville, Mr. Ponsonby, and many others, had declared their approbation of it, and it was regarded generally as the means of settling the Roman Catholic claims. At the very moment when this declaration was beginning to have the effect, which it was intended to have, these bishops turned round and recanted, These things were matters of history; and he should think he neglected his duty to the House, if he did not, as often as such petitions as this should be presented, recall these instances of the shameful tergiversation of the Roman Catholic clergy. They professed sentiments of attachment to the constitution, and of respect for the religion of the country in this petition; and yet in the letter which the hon. member for Cavan had just read, Dr. Doyle had described that religion as an incubus on the nation, and had compared its worship to that of the idol Juggernaut, to which human victims were sacrificed. And yet, after this, the same Dr. Doyle came to add his voice to the expressions of attachment and respect he had alluded to! He had had occasion before to notice some of the inconsistencies of that right rev. prelate, but never had the occasion seemed to him more urgent, or the inconsistency more glaring, than the present; and he was convinced that, if the House did not look earnestly and closely to the condition of Ireland, influenced as it now was by the Roman Catholic priesthood, they would find themselves exposed to dangers from which a retreat would be impossible. Lord F. L. Gower said, that the hon. gentleman who had just spoken appealed to history in support of his opinions. But there were two ways of appealing to history. The one was to swallow down every imputation made, without taking the trouble of examining it; the other was by a free investigation of facts, and that in the spirit of Christian charity. When any of the members for Ireland mentioned the penal laws, and, on the part of their constituents, called for the repeal of them, they were answered, that there were no such laws in existence. Either all these laws should be abrogated, or those that were repealed should be again re-enacted. But, was there any man now who would dare to propose the re-enactment of those laws? Was it fair to suppose that education and the light of truth had flashed on the minds of Protestants only, and that not one single ray had penetrated the obscure bosom of a Catholic? He did not stand up there as the advocate either of the rev. Patrick Corr or of Dr. Doyle. They might have their faults, as all men had. It was not to be denied that great and tremendous power devolved on the Catholic clergy. But, under what system and code of laws did they possess that power? The hon. member for Cavan had told the House that it was their duty to encourage the conversion of the Catholics in Ireland that conversion was the only remedy for the evils of that country. He applauded the suggestion of the hon. member; but it was not a new one. In the time of Charles the Second, the same suggestion was made by lord Tyrconnel to lord Bellasis, when Charles sought to reduce Ireland to subjection. Lord Tyrconnel told him, that the only remedy was to convert all the people of Ireland to the Catholic faith; on which lord Bellasis observed to Charles, that lord Tyrconnel was fool and madman enough to risk the loss of ten kingdoms for the sake of converting one soul, Sir William Plunkett said, that after the speech of the noble lord he would have been well contented that the subject should drop, but it was impossible for him to let what had fallen from the hon. member for Derry pass without observation. The House would recollect that, in opening this subject, he had abstained from touching on any of the topics which belonged to it; wishing that as little as possible should be said on them until Monday, which had been fixed for the discussion of the question, and being desirous not to excite any feeling on the subject before that day: he did hope, that the members of the House would cordially have joined him in the testimony which he bore, and which his conscience obliged him to bear to the loyalty, good conduct, and constitutional principles of the great body of the Catholic clergy of Ireland. He repeated, and there had not been any attempt to contradict the assertion, that they were distinguished for uniform loyalty and obedience to the laws. But the hon. gentleman, in the observations which he had thought fit to make had resorted to a method of dealing with them which was wholly unfair and unwarrantable, and which, if applied to any class of individuals, however great their collective respectability, would be much more than they could bear. He said, and he said it without the possibility of being contradicted, that the great body of the Catholic clergy of Ireland, who possessed a power far beyond what any gentleman not well acquainted with Ireland could form any idea of, had, upon all occasions, displayed a strong attachment to the laws, to the state, and to the king. But, how had the hon. members for the city and the county of Derry, and the hon. member for Cavan, endeavoured to shake, this well-earned reputation? By impeaching the conduct of the general body? No, but by bringing to the notice of the House, some circumstances which they did not approve of, in the conduct of individuals. If any person were to follow a similar course with respect to the great body of the Protestant clergy of Ireland, and should seek to impeach the whole body, by dragging before the public view the excesses of any one individual belonging to it, was this a test which they could abide by? Such a practice would lead to an odious and unsatisfactory system of recrimination, into which he would pot condescend to be led. But the use which had been made of it, showed its tendency to exasperate prejudices, so as to overcome all moral feeling, and to urge gentlemen, to make an attack which, on any other subject than this, their better judgment | logical disputes engendered, it was not to and better feelings would have induced them to abandon. As to Dr. Doyle's letter, he did not hesitate to say, that he utterly condemned the sentiments which it contained, and the manner in which those sentiments were expressed. But, was the great body of the Catholic priesthood therefore to be condemned? The hon. member for Cavan had said that this letter was addressed to a noble relative of his; but had the hon. gentleman called the attention of the House to the proceedings of that noble relative? He had no doubt that lord Farnham had been induced to adopt that conduct, from conscientious motives. He had taken upon himself to convert the Roman Catholics of Ireland to the Protestant religion. Had he, however, in the crusade which he had thought fit to undertake, done nothing which might have provoked the sentiments and expressions used in the letter which had been alluded to? To the endeavour of converting the Catholics of Ireland, he wished, from the bottom of his heart, the fullest success; but, at the same time, he must add, that it was without the least hope the pursuit being, in his opinion, the merest chimera that ever bewildered the mind of man. In the prosecution of this design, the persons who were engaged in it proceeded in the usual way; that was, by attacking the religion to which they were opposed, for the purpose of bringing its votaries over to their own. This might be prudent, as far as the attempt to attain their object was concerned; but was it likely to conciliate the clergy or laity of the opposing body? In zeal for the Protestant religion he would not yield to any man; and upon former occasions he had given unequivocal proofs of this feeling; but, his attachment to that religion could not make him insensible of the regard which others felt for the form of religion in which they had been educated. Was it likely that the Catholic clergy should stand quietly, with their arms folded, before their assailants, and make no defence when their religion was impugned? Did any man who was attacked by another, word in hand, content himself with parrying only? Did he not thrust in return? If any men, or set of men, were outraged, could it be expected that they would not outrage in return, and when in addition to this the nature of the contest was considered, the bellum plusquam civile which theo be wondered at, that the conflict should be carried on with pertinacity and rancour. He had reason to know, and it was his duty to tell the House, that from these disputes dangers must spring, which, he prayed to God, might be averted; but which, if they were not, must be, in their consequences, of a most alarming tendency. He knew that since this wild crusade had been commenced, a determination, which no man could blame, had been formed by the Catholic clergy, to discuss the merits of the two religions; and for this purpose to meet their adversaries openly. This was occasioned by the conduct of the Protestant clergy; none of whom he would at that moment name, but who, not content with exercising their labours in their own parishes, and from their own pulpits, had gone on journies and embassies throughout the country, challenging the Catholic clergy to meet and discuss the doctrines of the two religions, and even appealing to lay tribunals to decide between them. He did not advert to the manner in which they had joined to themselves all descriptions of sectarians and dissenters, whom they had called upon to make common cause with them against the Roman Catholics. The conduct of the Catholic clergy had been abstinent and becoming in a remarkable degree. They had refused to accept the challenges which were thus repeatedly sent to them; and they had, in consequence, been taunted for their forbearance, and told that it sprung from fear of their opponents. That abstinence and that fear, if they ever existed, were now at an end. The Catholic clergy had resolved to accept the invitation which had been given them to discuss the tenets of their faith, and unless the interference of common sense should put a stop to the headlong career of the persons he had alluded to, the whole force of the Catholic priesthood would be called out in this theological warfare. They would have I. K. L.'s, and all the other letters in the alphabet, taking part in the controversy; but was it clear that, after it had begun, this controversy would continue to be merely theological? Was it not to be apprehended, that the Catholic population of Ireland, who had been represented as an ignorant people, under the influence of a strong attachment to their clergy, would not be calm observers of a contest, in which their feelings and their passions, if not their |