HISTORY records a law of the ancient Lacædemonian legislature, by which every person of full age was obliged to belong to some party in the state. Without expressing any opinion upon the wisdom of the compulsory patriotism of the Grecian republic, we may safely venture to assert that there are times when circumstances and duty imperatively enforce the practical observance of such a rule; that there may be a crisis in the political concerns of a nation when no man can indulge his indolent desire for the peacefulness of private retirement, without a plain and positive dereliction of public duty. Assault may be carried on so far that it becomes treason not to join in the defence; there is a point in the progress of revolution, at which every man must make up his mind to take one side or other, when the friends of order may adopt as their motto "he that is not with us is against us," when neutrality is a crime, and even moderation is a fault, because the energies-the active-the uncompromising energies of all the friends of order, are required to prevent its subversion. When the struggle is plainly and undisguisedly between the evil and the good; the man whose principles would lead him to support what is right, if he withholds his assistance from the righteous cause, is virtually subtracting so much from the power of that cause, and is giving so much of negative, but not, therefore, the less injurious assistance to the other. He is worse than the most violent partizan of wrong, because he adds to the guilt of assisting what is wrong, the baseness of abandoning what is right. Truth must look on him not merely as an enemy, but a traitor. "He knows what is right but he does it not."

These are not days for soft words, or for the concealment of honest and manly opinion, and accordingly we have little hesitation in translating into broad, intelligible language, the import of the few observations with which we have commenced. The

events of the last few years have been such as to force upon every man the consciousness that in the few next the fate of England will be decided. There may have been former periods of political excitement, when the passions of the people were roused into unnatural agitation, and the quiet of the country disturbed, and the healthy functions of the constitution interfered with. But all these disturbances have been temporary in their duration and transient in their effects; they have been the storms that swept harmless over the face of society, left no trace of their ravages behind; but far otherwise is the case in these days of political convulsion; the constitution itself is the stake that is at hazard, the religion and the liberties of Britain are assailed-every principle that has hitherto guided the councils of the nation, is set at nought-every sanction of the national religion is disregarded-infidelity has openly shown itself as the ally and the pioneer of anarchy, and in trampling on all the maxims, and all the institutions of our social faith, is going far towards breaking up all the restraints of social order. The question now is, whether we shall continue as we have been, a nation united in the sacred compact of citizenship, with Christianity as the bond of our union; or be resolved and separated into the broken fragments of a people without either a religion to control, or a government to restrain; and we say that the man who contents himself with a mere tacit acquiescence in the principles of truth; who permits his theoretical attachment to the constitution to slumber in operative inaction, and does not give his every energy to its support-be his professions of philanthropy, or sanctity, what they may-is virtually indifferent alike to the sanctions of religion and the calls of patriotism, and is, at heart, not merely a rebel to his country, but a traitor to his God.

We express ourselves thus plainly and strongly, not merely because we

have accustomed ourselves to an awkward habit of calling things and persons by their right names-a habit that is certainly inconvenient in days when, in most instances, these names are anything but complimentary. We cannot indeed, upon any occasion, tame down the expression of our honest feelings to the measured terms of polite discretion; but in the present case we feel that it is necessary to speak out. Protestants do not appear sufficiently sensible of the moral guilt and the moral turpitude of inaction: in politics they seem unaccountably to leave out sins of omission from their catalogue of offences, and forget that the leaving undone the things which we ought to have done, is scarcely second in enormity to the doing the things which we ought not to have done. And yet the end of all moral obligation is no less the enjoining of certain duties than the forbidding of certain crimes; and we forfeit our allegiance to truth no less by the neglect of the one than by the commission of the other. But if there be one duty more than another which is plainly binding upon us in our capacity of citizens, it is to endeavour, at all hazards and at any cost, to preserve to succeeding generations the blessings we ourselves enjoy-blessings which God, who is the author of all society, has given us in trust for them-and this is a trust which we cannot decline, and which, therefore, if we neglect we violate. The time has now come when it is only by active and strenuous exertions that this trust can be discharged; and if we shrink from these exertions-no matter under what specious epithets we palliate our conduct to others-no matter by what plausible excuses we justify it to ourselves-we are guilty of a base and unworthy dereliction of a duty which our Creator has enjoined upon us; and the stern language of truth can apply to our neglect no softer epithets than cowardice and crime.

The Protestants of Ireland have commenced a great and, we believe, a decisive movement. Those who have been long assailed, have at length put themselves in an attitude of defence the men upon whom war has been made for years, have at length seemed to feel that hostilities are going on;

and even in the eleventh hour, when our liberties are all but lost, and our cause is all but hopeless, a vigorous and determined stand has been made against that tyranny which, under the specious name of liberality, is trampling on the rights and privileges which our fathers purchased with their blood. We repeat, that this movement is decisive of our fate; if it be successful-and successful it must be, if it be not the fault of the Protestants themselves-the victory is gained, and the country is saved: if, on the contrary, the apathy, the indolence, or the cowardice of Protestants neutralize this last effort of their more honest and more determined brethren-if the few be now left unsupported to sustain the cause of the many-then all hope of ever organizing a Protestant party is at an endand it will in future be little short of madness in any one to expose himself to the fury of revolution by attempting the task of staying its progress-it would be a self-sacrifice, without either an object or a hope.

The meeting at the Mansion-house was a noble and a cheering beginning of this effort. We may safely say that never was there so much of the intellect, the rank, and the property of the country represented in any public meeting. Never did so resolute, and at the same time so Christian a spirit pervade an assembly, and never do we remember to have witnessed such gratifying demonstrations of attachment to the principles of truth. But while we feel the moral influence which this great meeting must have already produced upon the feelings of the country-while we know that its proceedings must have their weight, even with our enemies, we yet feel, with Lord Roden, that did it terminate merely in the brilliant and eloquent speeches which swayed as one man the minds of the multitude that was assembled, or in the printed report of those speeches which has conveyed the sentiments of the speakers throughout the empire, it would, after all, be but a splendid failure. It is as the first of a series of efforts that we look on it as the most important meeting that ever was convened; and if we do not altogether mistake the character of those who have nobly come forward to give direction to those efforts, we may

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hen safely venture to predict that they will be worthy of our sacred cause, and that unless Protestants, by the most inexcusable indolence, prove themselves, both to God and man, worthy of the blessings they enjoy, that cause will be triumphant, and Protestants will be yet permitted the undisturbed exercises of their religion, and left to retain those privileges the preservation of which has been so often and so solemnly guaranteed to them. We know that many weak, but well meaning, persons object to any attempt to rouse the Protestant population of the North, by the instrumentality of public meetings, because, forsooth, it savours too much of Protestant agitation. Every honest prejudice we respect, and every honest objection we would labour to remove; but the generality of mankind are far too easily imposed upon by names. If by agitation be meant that selfish and unprincipled excitement of the passions of the mob, which has no other end or aim than the personal aggrandizement of the agitator. If, by agitation, be meant that reckless setting of the lower orders against the higher, that has gone far towards breaking up all the relations of society-that wicked inculcation of disobedience to the laws which has desolated Ireland with blood, and caused the theoretical lesson of the day to be put in practice in the midnight assassination-then we say God forbid that ever our cause should be desecrated by such unholy means; but if on the other hand men choose to fasten on us the name of agitators, because we endeavour to oppose misrule, and to bring forth the peaceable and constitutional expression of public opinion, because we call on those whose rights are assailed to resist aggression on those whose properties are threatened, to protest against spoliation-then we say that we are not to be frightened from our duty by a name. We would look on the man as a fool who would quietly suffer himself to be robbed, lest resistance might gain for him the epithet of brawlerand we certainly will not permit our rights to be taken away without a struggle, because our enemies may give to our efforts to retain them, the name of agitation.

We believe that public opinion is

decidedly conservative-we are persuaded that could the honest and unbiassed sentiments of each member of the community be ascertained-there would be found an immense majority in the cause of order. But unfortunately the destructives are the most clamorous and noisy portion of the community-and it is this very circumstance that has given to them the appearance of having public opinion in their favour. And this advantage, which is no trifling one, they knew well how to turn to account. Most men are, in their opinions, the creatures of circumstances; all of us influenced more or less by the political atmosphere in which we breathe. While the conservative party neglect to take some efficient means to contradict the notion that the mass of the people are opposed to them-they throw into the ranks of their enemies all the waverers and paralyse the efforts of their friends. There are in every community a number of persons who are influenced by public opinion, or what they believe to be public opinion-and every demonstration of national feeling on either side of the question, tells powerfully upon this large, and therefore, under our present system of government, this influential class. It is thus that public opinion in its expression may be said to reproduce and multiply itself-and it is precisely by acting on this principle, that the radicals have succeeded; they have taken every opportunity of putting themselves forward as the national party, and as the advocates of the cause of the people; and the falsehood was uncontradicted until it was believed-and men whose every predilection, and all whose convictions were in favour of the constitution, began to fancy themselves radical, simply because they heard that radicalism was the national party. General opinion does not depend so much upon general conviction, as is frequently supposed; if it did, it would not be so proverbially fluctuating and unsteady. To any one who has taken any trouble to find out the true state of feeling among the lower and middling orders, it is well known that many are enthusiastically attached to radicalism who do not know what it is, and who, while they express the most vehement regard for its principles in general, would yet be found,

on examination, to dissent from them in detail. But it is with nations as with individuals. Let a man be told by all who meet him, that he is falling into ill-health, and most probably the prediction will work out its own fulfilment. The enemies of the constitution have played off their tricks upon the political hypochondriasm of the nation, and told the people that they were Radicals until they became so.

It is time for the Conservatives to provide an organ of expression for that strong feeling in their favour which prevails, and thus check the progress of that moral madness which is destroying the energies of Britain. It is now necessary to restore a sound state of public feeling, by teaching the people to be regulated not by their passions but by their judgment. We must now endeavour to place before their minds the true principles of our constitution, so as to force them to make a deliberate selection between these principles and the opposite, and when this selection is fairly put to them, we have very little doubt as to the result. But there is need of every energy, and every power which the Conservative party have at their command-this may appear inconsistent with our declaration, that the feeling of the country is in our favour; but surely we need not repeat the trite observation as to the advantage which the assailing party, almost invariably possess. Hatred to an institution, is an active principle-attachment to it, is a passive feeling of the mind-excitement is the essence and the soul of radicalismbut a high and enlightened love for the institutions of the country, is but too often combined with an aversion, or at least a disinclination, to active political exertion; men who have long looked upon their social system, as a blessing to be enjoyed, and not a sub

ject for endless contention and strife, begin to feel as if they were asked to depart from their principles, when they are called on to exert themselves in its defence-and though this feeling be not directly avowed to their own minds, yet it exercises an influence no less powerful. Against all these difficulties we feel that we have to contend-against the energy of our opponents, and the want of it among our friends-but we are persuaded that by active, and ju dicious exertions, all those religious and therefore Conservative feelings, which are now scattered over the surface of society, cheering and beautifying all the relations of life, may be concentrated into powerful, and indeed we may say omnipotent, political force. The same rays of light which scattered their radiance through the atmosphere, when concentrated by the burning glass of the Sicilian philosopher, became powerful to consume the navies of the invading foe.

We could say much more upon the necessity of exertion on the part of the Protestants, but we feel that we should apologise to our readers for having thus long detained them from the immediate consideration of the great meeting upon which we write.The speeches delivered at that meeting, are long since before the Protestants of the empire; and we are sure that the honest and manly expression of opinion which was called forth-the powerful reasonings and the splendid eloquence which marked the truly important proceedings of that memorable day, have had their weight and their effect with our brethren upon both sides of the channel. But we are sure that we will not enter upon a task, the performance of which can be unacceptable to our readers, if we bring before their view a short retrospect of some of the most remarkable circumstances

connected with it. Many of the statements that were made are too important to be trusted to the perishable columns of a newspaper report: and while it is very far from our intention to attempt an analysis of the speeches that were delivered, and while we are conscious that, did we do so, neither our space nor our ability would permit us to do justice to the speakers, there are yet some remarks upon which we may venture, without incurring the charge of unnecessary repetition-some individuals whom we may particularise, without appearing to institute any partial or invidius distinctions.

The presence of Lord Winchelsea was, unquestionably, one of the most gratifying circumstances connected with this meeting. It is to our English brethren that we must look in the hour of danger and distress-it is to their cooperation and support that we must be indebted for the peaceable enjoy. ment of our blessings-without this we could not hope to retain even our liberties without the force of armsand while even for that last dread resource the Protestants of Ireland would, at the call of duty, be prepared while they are ready, if the progress of social disorganization should place them in such a position, to exercise that indefeasible right which God and nature have conferred on them-the right of self-preservation-we do not believe that there is a single Protestant in Ireland who would not rather owe his security and his freedom to the constitutional exertions of his English brethren, aided by his own, than to the extra-constitutional triumphs of an outraged and indignant people. The Earl of Winchelsea we may safely regard as the representative of all that is good and constitutional in the aristocracy of England, and the appearance of this Christian nobleman, to stand by us at a time when it is but too much the fashion to forsake and misrepresent us, is an earnest, to our minds, that our cause is not altogether desperate that those who love their religion in England, will not view with indifference its persecution and extinction in Ireland that those Englishmen who love their Bibles, will not yet permit the Romish priesthood to make of ours a pile for the immolation of Irish Protestantism; and if, even in the

Vo. IV.

worst of times, God gives to his people an earnest that he has not altogether forsaken them, we may see this earnest to ourselves in the consolatory assurance that worth and piety made conspicuous, although not ennobled by exalted station, are enthusiastically en gaged in our cause.

Of Lord Winchelsea himself, we will not speak as our own feelings would dictate, or as his character and conduct would deserve. The time of danger is not the season for panegyric, and yet if even in the hottest of the fight, the cheer of the engaged battalions is sometimes sent along the lines to encourage the bravery of their comrades, we may perhaps be excused, if we tell his lordship, that while all his former character commanded our respect, his conduct upon this occasion, has deepened respect into veneration, and kindled attachment into love. The enthusiasm with which he was hailed by the multitude assembled to receive him at the Mansion-house, extends itself to the bosom of every Protestant in the land; and we are sure, that Lord Winchelsea will not feel that we are taking from his merits when we say, that highly as we venerate him, as the consistent advocate of national Christianity, and the consistent Christian in his private acts--as the fearless supporter of sound principle, and the most perfect example of its blessed effects-as the man across whose whole life, no slander of enmity or malice, has ever thrown the suspicion of a discreditable act-we yet venerate him still more, when we look on him in connection with one whom we know better, and whom he closely resembles a nobleman, in whom we have seen all that is amiable in private, expanded into all that is estimable in public life. Lord Winchelsea will pardon us when we say, that the title by which he finds his surest way to the hearts of Irish Protestants, is the one which perhaps is the highest that could be conferred on him. Our hearts warm, and our associations of all that we have been taught to love awake towards the man on whom truth confers the ennobling epithet of THE ENGLISH RODEN.

From the speeches which were delivered at the meeting, we can have little difficulty in selecting three as pe

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