When proud Napoleon, like the burning shield1 That, in this hour, when patriot zeal should guide, To enemies made fiends, and friends made foes, Is the rank refuse, the despised remains Of that unpitying power, whose whips and chains Turn false to England's bed, and whore with France. So useless ever, but in vile employ, So weak to save, so vigorous to destroy! Such are the men that guard thy threaten'd shore, INTOLERANCE. A SATIRE. "This clamour, which pretends to be raised for the safety of religion, has almost worn out the very appearance of it, and rendered us not only the most divided but the most immoral people upon the face of the earth.'-Addison, Freeholder, No. 37. START not, my friend, nor think the muse will stain Of Bulls, Decrees, and all those thundering scrolls, 1 The magician's shield in Ariosto: We are told that Cæsar's code of morality was The following prophetic remarks occur in a letter written by Sir Robert Talbot, who attended the Duke of Bedford to Paris in 1762. Talking of States which have grown powerful in commerce, he says, 'According to the nature and common course of things, there is a confederacy against them, and consequently, in the same proportion as they increase in riches, they approach to destruction. The address of our King William, in making all Europe take the alarm at France, has brought that country before us near that inevitable period. We must necessarily have our turn, and Great Britain will attain it as soon as France shall have a declaimer with organs as proper for that political purpose as were those of our William the Third. Without doubt, my Lord, Great Britain must lower her flight. Europe will remind us of the balance of commerce, as she has reminded France of the balance of power. The address of our statesmen will immortalize them by contriving for us a descent which shall not be a fall, by making us rather resemble Holland than Carthage and Venice.'-Letters on the French Nation. 3 The king-deposing doctrine, notwithstanding its many mischievous absurdities, was of no little service to the cause of political liberty, by incul cating the right of resistance to tyrants, and asserting the will of the people to be the only true fountain of power. Bellarmine, the most violent of the advocates for papal authority, was one of the first to maintain (De Pontif., lib. i. cap. 7) that kings have not their authority or office immediately from God nor his law, but only from the law of nations; and in King James's 'Defence of the Rights of Kings against Cardinal Perron,' we find his Majesty expressing strong indignation against the Cardinal for having as When heaven was yet the pope's exclusive trade, Who loathe the venom, whencesoe'er it springs, So near a precipice, that men the while Look breathless on and shudder while they smile- To hapless Ireland, to this rankling nook Which Heaven hath freed from poisonous things in vain, While G-ff-rd's tongue and M-sgr-ve's pen remain- To shade thine eyes from this devoted spot, Whose wrongs, though blazon'd o'er the world they be, Oh! turn awhile, and, though the shamrock wreathes And oh my friend, wert thou but near me now, E'en through the blood-marks left by C-md-n3 there,— serted that to the deposing of a king the consent of the people must be obtained' for by these words (says James) the people are exalted above the king, and made the judges of the king's deposing' (p. 424). The Sella Stercoraria' of the popes.-The Right Honoural 1 and learned Doctor will find an engraving of this chair in Spanheim's 'Disquisitio istorica de Papâ Fominâ' (p. 118); and I recommend it as a model for the fashion of that seat which the Doctor is about to take in the privy-council of Ireland. 2 When Innocent X. was entreated to decide the controversy between the Jesuits and the Jansenists, he answered, that he had been bred a lawyer, and had therefore nothing to do with divinity. It were to be wished that some of our English pettifoggers knew their own fit element as well as Pope Innocent X. 3 Not the C-md-n who speaks thus of Ireland: To wind up all, whether we regard the fruitfulness of the soil, the advantage of the sea, with so many commodious havens, or the natives Couldst thou but see what verdure paints the sod Who, arm'd at once with prayer-books and with whips,2 Your R-desd-les, P-rc-v-ls,-O gracious Heaven, themselves, who are warlike, ingenious, handsome and well-complexioned, soft-skinned and very nimble, by reason of the pliantness of their muscles, this island is in many respects so happy, that Giraldus might very well say, 'Nature had regarded with more favourable eyes than ordinary this Kingdom of Zephyr." The example of toleration, which Bonaparte has held forth, will, I fear, produce no other effect than that of determining the British Government to persist, from the very spirit of opposition, in their own old system of intolerance and injustice; just as the Siamese blacken their teeth, because,' as they say, 'the devil has white ones. 2 One of the unhappy results of the controversy between Protestants and Catholics, is the mutual exposure which their criminations and recriminations have produced. In vain do the Protestants charge the Papists with closing the door of salvation upon others, while many of their own writings and articles breathe the same uncharitable spirit. No canon of Constance or Lateran ever damned heretics more effectually than the eighth of the Thirty-nine Articles consigns to perdition every single member of the Greek Church; and I doubt whether a more sweep ing clause of damnation was ever proposed in the most bigoted council, than that which the Calvinistic theory of predestination in the seventeenth of these Articles exhibits. It is true that no liberal Protestant avows such exclusive opinions; that every honest clergyman must feel a pang while he subscribes to them; that some even assert the Athanasian Creed to be the forgery of one Vigilius Tapsensis, in the beginning of the sixth century, and that eminent divines, like Jortin, have not hesitated to say, 'There are propositions contained in our Liturgy and Articles, which no man of common sense amongst us believes.' But while all this is freely conceded to Protestants, while nobody doubts their sincerity, when they declare that their articles are not essentials of faith, but a collection of opinions which have been promulgated by fallible men, and from many of which they feel themselves justified in dissenting,-while so much liberty of retractation is allowed to Protestants upon their own declared and subscribed articles of religion, is it not strange that a similar indulgence should be so obstinately refused to the Catholics, upon tenets which their Church has uniformly resisted and condemned, in every country where it has independently flourished? When the Catholies say,The decree of the Council of Lateran, which you object to us, has no claim whatever upon either our faith or our reason; it did not even profess to contain any doctrinal decision, but was merely a judicial proceeding of that assembly; and it would be as fair for us to impute a wife-killing doctrine to the Protestants, because their first pope, Henry VIII., was sanctioned in an indulgence of that propensity, as for you to conclude that we have inherited a king-deposing taste from the acts of the Council of Lateran, or the secular pretensions of our Popes.' 3 In a singular work, written by one Franciscus Collius, 'Upon the Souls of the Pagans,' the author discusses, with much coolness and erudition, all the probable chances of salvation upon which a heathen philosopher might calculate. Consigning to perdition, without much difficulty, Plato, Socrates, &c., the only sage at whose fate he seems to hesitate is Pythagoras, in consideration of his golden thigh, and the many miracles which he performed. But, having balanced a little his And take my chance with Socrates for bliss, Adds the slave's suffering to the sinner's fear, Of heavenly justice warm the Christian's dreams; claims, and finding reason to father all these miracles on the devil, he at length, in the twentyfifth chapter, decides upon damning him also. (De Animabus Paganorum, lib. iv. cap. 20 and 25.) The poet Dante compromises the matter with the Pagans, and gives them a neutral territory or limbo of their own, where their employment, it must be owned, is not very enviableSenza speme vivemo indesio.'-Canto iv. Among the numerous errors imputed to Origen, he is accused of having denied the eternity of future punishment; and, if he never advanced a more irrational doctrine, we may venture, I think, to forgive him. He went so far, however, as to include the devil himself in the general helldelivery which he supposed would one day or other take place, and in this St. Augustin thinks him rather too merciful-Misericordior profecto fuit Origenes, qui et ipsum diabolum,' &c. (De Civitat. Dei, lib. xxi. cap. 17.) St. Jerom says that, according to Origen, the devil, after a certain time, will be as well off as the angel Gabriel,'Id ipsum fore Gabrielem quod diabolum. (See his Epistle to Pammachius.') But Hallois, in his Defence of Origen,' denies that he had any of this misplaced tenderness for the devil.-I take the liberty of recommending these notitie upon damnation to the particular attention of the learned Chancellor of the Exchequer. 1 Mr. Fox, in his speech on the repeal of the Test Act (1790), thus condemns the intermixture of religion with the political constitution of a State: What purpose,' he asks, 'can it serve, except the baleful purpose of communicating and receiving contamination? Under such an alliance corruption must alight upon the one, and slavery overwhelm the other." Locke, too, says of the connexion between Church and State: The boundaries on both sides are fixed and immovable. He jumbles heaven and earth together, the things most remote and opposite, who mixes these two societies, which are in their original, end, business, and in everything, perfectly distinct and infinitely different from each other.'-First Letter on Toleration. The corruptions introduced into Christianity may be dated from the period of its establishi ment under Constantine, nor could all the splendour which it then acquired atone for the peace and purity which it lost. 2 There has been, after all, quite as much intolerance among Protestants as among Papists, According to the hackneyed quotation 'Iliacos intra muros peccatur et extra.' Even the great champion of the Reformation, Melancthon, whom Jortin calls a divine of much mildness and good nature,' thus expresses his approbation of the burning of Servetus: Legi,' he says to Bullinger, quæ de Serveti blasphemiis respondistis, et pietatem ac judicia vestra probo. Judico etiam senatum Genevensem rectè fecisse, quod hominem pertinacem et non omissurum blasphemias sustulit ; ac miratus sum esse qui severitatem illam improbent.' I have much pleasure in contrasting with these mild and good-natured' sentiments the following words of the Papist Baluze, in addressing his friend Conringius:- Interim amemus, mî Conringi, et tametsi diversas opiniones tuemur in causâ religionis, moribus tamen diversi non simus, qui eadem literarum studia sectamur.'-Herman. Conring. Epistol. par. secund., p. 56. 3 La tolérance est la chose du monde la plus propre à ramener le siècle d'or, et à faire un concert et une harmonie de plusieurs voix et instruments de différents tons et notes, aussi agré Such was the spirit, grandly, gently bright, And feels but half thy loss while Grattan lives. APPENDIX. THE following is part of a Preface which was intended by a friend and countryman of mine for a collection of Irish airs, to which he has adapted English words. As it has never been published, and is not inapplicable to my subject, I shall take the liberty of subjoining it here. Our history, for many centuries past, is creditable neither to our neighbours nor ourselves, and ought not to be read by any Irishman who wishes either to love England or to feel proud of Ireland. The loss of independence very early debased our character; and our feuds and rebellions, though frequent and ferocious, but seldom displayed that generous spirit of enterprise with which the pride of an independent monarchy so long dignified the struggles of Scotland. It is true this island has given birth to heroes who, under more favourable circumstances, might have left in the hearts of their countrymen recollections as dear as those of a Bruce or a Wallace; but success was wanting to consecrate resistance, their cause was branded with the disheartening name of treason, and their oppressed country was such a blank among nations, that, like the adventures of those woods which Rinaldo wished to explore, the fame of their actions was lost in the obscurity of the place where they achieved them. Errando in quelli boschi Trovar potria strane avventure e molte, Hence is it that the annals of Ireland, through a lapse of six hundred years, exhibit not one of those shining names, not one of those themes of national pride, from which poetry borrows her noblest inspiration; and that history, which ought to be the richest garden of the Muse, yields nothing to her but weeds and cypress. In truth, the poet who would embellish his songs with allusions to Irish names and events, must be contented to seek them in those early periods when our character was yet unalloyed and original, before the impolitic craft of our conquerors had divided, weakened, and disgraced us; and the only traits of heroism, indeed, which he can venture at this day to commemorate, with safety to himself, or perhaps with honour to his country, are to be looked for in those times when the native monarchs of Ireland dis able pour le moins que l'uniformité d'une seule voix.'- Bayle, Commentaire Philosophique, &c., part ii. chap. vi. Both Bayle and Locke would have treated the subject of Toleration in a man ner much more worthy of themselves and of the cause, if they had written in an age less distracted by religious prejudices. 1 Ariosto, canto iv. |