made it!) that the permanency and inviolableness of the English Protestant Establishment will be maintained, nay, that the interest of the united Churches of England and Ireland and of the Kirk of Scotland, with their respective doctrine, discipline and government, will be promoted by entrusting the administration of that constitution by which those churches are protected, and "of which they form an essential part," to men who believe that DOCTRINE to be abominably and damnably heretical; and that discipline and government to be in no less degree schismatical, and therefore abominable before God; who therefore are bound, and are taught by their Church to consider themselves as bound, by every motive that can animate a man sincerely pious, nay, by every obligation which divine or human institutions can impose, to destroy that doctrine, and to change that discipline and government! Looking upon this simply as it is stated, and considering who is the father of this monstrous proposition, one would be apt at first sight to suppose that the right honourable gentleman, whose acknowledged talents are mixed up with no small degree of peculiarity, bad an intention of trying how far the credulity of a House of Commons might be carried; perhaps, too, by the solemn introduction of so extraordinary a paradox into a bill of the United Parliament, he aimed at removing from his countrymen the imputation of dealing exclusively in that commodity emphatically called Irish (to distinguish them, it may be, from Romish) Bulls. The fact is, however, with this, as with almost all the Irish Bulls, that, however contradictory or confused the expressions may appear, there is a meaning sufficiently clear in the mind of the person who utters them; and that meaning can be no other than that which we have stated, and, by this instrument is here solemnly recorded, that the loyalty of the Roman Catholics must be purchased, and that the price can be no other than the surrender (as we contend) of our constitution, or undoubtedly the placing it in extreme hazard. We repeat it, and shall always most deliberately maintain it, that the passing of such a bill as that introduced by Mr. Grattan, would give a deep wound, if not a mortal stab to our Protestant Constitution. "No matter," (Mr. Grattan and Mr. Keagh tell us,) without this, we cannot get the better of Buonaparte." Are we then in the situation of our ancestors the Britons, when they called in the Saxons to defend them against the Scots and the Picts? If we are indeed, nothing more is to be said:

"Oremus pacem, et dextras tendamus inerles ;" but we are not in that situation. At any rate let us not be deceived; and let it be understood what must be the state to which we shall be reduced, and the advantage which we shall gain by this famous" binding" of us," by the

same privileges and the same interest,"* in defence of our country: we must prepare ourselves for fresh sacrifices: we may by this means, indeed, purchase peace, but it will be such a peace as the conquered enjoy; such as was obtained by the Britons after calling in the Saxons; and even that not unless we tamely and implicitly submit. If, after having added to the power which the Romanists now have of disturbing the State, and even, as their advocates say, of overthrowing it, we will, in order to avoid further disturbances, give up our Church Establishment; if, after that, we will give up our Faith, and consent that the Pope shall be our Spiritual Head, and the director of our conscience; it may be our fault if, after all this shall come upon us, there be any internal commotions or discontents in the empire. Only we must prepare ourselves for a different sort of liberality from that which is now professed among us. Particularly, we must not think of keeping such naughty books as Fox's Martyrs, or Wake's Exposition of the Doctrines of (what will then be) the (late) Church of England! Nay, even Locke must be removed from our shelves, for such is the decree of the congregation of the index; and for the authorised translation of the Bible, we must substitute the Popish perverted rendering. But then we shall have peace and quiet; and very possibly we shall not be subdued by Buonaparte ;-perhaps we shall only live under his protection, and that of Cardinal Fesch, then become Sixtus VIII.; if, indeed, Sixtus VII. will not do (as he seems to do) well enough. With the Irish Protestants indeed there may be a further account to be settled; and those great lords and gentlemen who possess estates anciently forfeited by the Papists, may have certain other sacrifices to make; in which case we will do the ser vants of our Lord the Pope the justice to believe that they will proceed with perfect impartiality, that they will adopt general measures, and that they will not at all consider on which side any holder of such lands has voted either in or out of Parliament. We know indeed of no instance where any set of men, who, from servility or timidity, or factious motives, having betrayed their country, have ultimately fared any better than those whom they delivered up to the adversary;-nay, they have commonly fared much worse; and for our parts we verily believe that the Roman Catholics have more real respect for us, who stand firm in our principles, than for many who call themselves their friends. Every one knows how those gentlemen have been repeatedly treated by the Irish Romanists. At this moment Mr. Plunkett is in Ireland, vainly endeavouring to conciliate 3 X 2

* Which we may be sure the Roman Catholics will by-and-by, in their good time, tell us cannot be, while we enjoy exclusively the honours and emoluments of an Ecclesiastical Establishment. Another fallacy of this preamble.

them; he has been cut by Mr. Scully, and treated not much better by Mr. O'Connell. In the mean time he has had to digest the pointed and direct judgment of the Romish Bishops of that country condemning the bill. In favour of Mr. Grattan's efforts we have only the soi-disant "Catholic" Board in England; a set of noblemen and gentlemen, very respectable in themselves, and certainly disclaiming most pointedly those doctrines of Popery which are more immediately dangerous to the State, but of no influence with the body at large, and comparatively very few in number, (perhaps not a hundred out of the half million, which Sir John Coxe Hippisley considers as the amount of the Romish population in this part of the United Kingdom;) and who will probably conclude their labours by submitting, (as they did in 1791,) with a good or ill grace, to the censures of their Vicars Apostolical; and some of them perhaps by making, as Mr. Berington has done, a formal recantation.

We have dwelt thus long on this preamble of Mr. Grattan's Bill, because it may be considered as intended for an authorised exposition of the grounds on which the bill was to pass. We shall now proceed to the bill itself; and it will there be seen, how exactly the principle has been followed which the right honourable mover appears to have set before him, how entirely all its clauses are drawn up with a view of conceding all that was possible to be conceded at this moment, and preparing the way, as he himself openly declared, for further and unlimited concession. We adverted to this in our last number. Indeed, only a slight, very slight reserve was even now to be made. While we were told that the Protestant succession to the Crown was to be permanently and inviolably preserved, it would have been too gross a mockery to have given to our Protestant 50vereign a Popish keeper of his conscience, or a Popish representative in Ireland; or to have suffered our permanent and inviolable Protestant Church Establishment to be administered by Popish officers. So much therefore it was necessary in common decency to reserve. But all else is given up; corporations, offices of State, the highest military and even naval commands, the legislature,-all is thrown open. But we are, it seems, to have full security. The Papists shall swear. Now, considering the objections which have been commonly received as current among Protestants, to allowing the oath of a Papist to be any security, is this a security, likely to be taken as sufficient by Protestants? And yet the Protestants, we have been assured, are to be sa tisfied as well as the others; which, in truth, considering that they are such a preponderating majority, is no more than we might rea sonably expect. This however, we shall probably be told, is all a mistake, it is bigotry, it is folly; it must not be listened to. There is no reason to doubt the oath of a papist. We shall, however, just venture

to offer one short argument in our favour. The obligation of an oath arises from religion: from the religious feelings of the party. But where a man is persuaded that his religion, or, we should say in this case, his particular sect, is the only true one; that it is the only way to salvation; when he is taught, consequently, nay, enjoined by those who are his immediate instructors and directors, that it is his duty by all means to extend its empire, and to put down all other creeds and all other religious establishments, will not all this form a paramount obligation, which may effectually overrule and nullify any oath which he may take in contradiction to it? Of our own knowledge we can speak to instances where the laws of hospitality have been most grossly violated in order to make a proselyte: one of them so notorious that only delicacy towards the individuals keeps us from specifying it more particularly: where parents have had their children seduced from the faith, in which they had been by them educated, under their very eye, and yet without the least intima. tion of what was going on, until it burst upon them like a thunderclap. Would those who could be guilty of such base, such cruel conduct, seraple at the violation of an oath, particularly of one which they must consider as imposed upon them against their wishes, if not against their consciences?

This is upon a supposition that the oath would be taken. But we have all the reason in the world to believe that this would not be the case. The forbearance of Protestants has been tried; it is found that no advantage is taken of any neglect or omission: and so, not a single Romanist except one female, has taken the oaths now required, for these last ten years: although by not taking them, they remain liable to every penal statute which stands in our books against popery, nay those who have been perverted (for we we will not say reconciled) to Popery, and those who have perverted them, are liable to be condemned as traitors! Yet they decline taking the oath, and making the declaration, which alone give them protection! Indeed Mr. Canning himself (in the debate of Tuesday, May 11th, on Sir J. C. Hippisley's motion) declared his expectation that it would be so; and he argued, from the annual act of indemnity, that the legislature itself cared very little whether oaths were taken or not. He said (if we may trust the reports in the newspapers) that it was an oath of qualification, not of infliction !!" Certainly it is an oath of qualification; but how does that prove that the oath is not to be taken ? Mr. Canning says, "who would think it worth while to enquire how many Protestants, within a certain number of months, had taken the oath of allegiance?"

* We request the attention of our readers to this observation. The Protestants are not persecutors.

And does Mr. Canning seriously mean to put the taking of oaths to the Government by Protestants and by Papists upon the same footing? Does he mean to say, will he venture to say, that there is the same reason for suspecting a Protestant, of disaffection towards a Protestant government, as there is for suspecting a Pupist? Does not Mr. Canning know that in almost all the cases where the oath of allegiance, and more especially that of supremacy, is required, it was so required in order to keep out Papists; that the one and the other were directed against them, and not against the Protestant subjects of this realm? And that the oaths and declarations which were substituted instead of these, were imposed as conditions for admitting them to the enjoyment of that constitution to which they had made themselves strangers? Mr. Canning must know that there is good cause why a Papist should make profession of his loyalty. The situation in which he stands with the pope makes it necessary. He professes to owe to the king allegiance only in part :—and that part which is withheld, he professes to owe to a foreign power. But is this the case with Protestants? Is there any such cause for suspicion as to them? Yet such it seems is the sort of language which is held to the legislature, even while it is enacting the taking of oaths as an essential security against the confessedly pernicious doctrines of the Romish Church!!! In the mouth of Smelfungus, of the angelic or seraphic doctor, or any of the masters of Mr. Canning's master in theology, (the honourable baronet), such reasonings might sound well enough, but are they to be endured in a British senator? The Catholic doctrine, it seems, now is, not that oaths are to be broken, but that they are not to be taken. And in truth, this has always been the doctrine of the Pope, with respect to all oaths that derogate from his pretensions; and upon that he grounds his other doctrine, that, if taken, they should not be kept.

We have been almost insensibly led into this consideration of Mr. Canning's arguments; because the very monstrousness of them seemed irresistibly to call for animadversion; but our reasoning required only, for it went only, upon the fact of his assertion and of his expectation. He is one witness, a witness against himself, that the Papists will not take the oaths, nay, will not be expected to take the oaths, which are held out as gi ving such full and complete security; for such is the sum of Mr. Grattan's labours, all that his protecting care had devised for ensuring the perma mency and inviolability of the Protestant established Church. We ought to add indeed, (and we beg Mr. Grattan's and our readers' pardon for having omitted it,) that it is further to be enacted,-That no alien, not any person who has not been resident within the United Kingdom during the last five years, shall be capable of exercising the functions of a bishop or of a dean within the United Kingdom;-and we are rather glad to