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Their commanders were directed to "consume, destroy, and demolish all the places where the rebels were relieved or harboured;" to "kill, slay, and destroy all the rebels and their relievers.”744 But this was not all, nor half. How can I proceed to relate the execrable tale? It will hardly be believed. For the honour of human nature, it were to be wished that it could be utterly blotted from the records of history: but this is impossible. There it remains, and there it will eternally remain, to the never-dying infamy of those miscreant rulers. The orders close with a direction "to kill and destroy all the men able to bear arms," in the places where the rebels were "relieved and harboured!!!!”*

The murderous spirit of these orders for the destruction of the barbourers of the insurgents, must excite the most unqualified horror and indignation in every man not utterly destitute of the feelings of humanity. It may be readily conceived, that defenceless individuals, scattered over an extensive country, cannot possibly prevent armed bodies of men from access to their houses or plantations; nor can the inhabitants of cities, towns, or villages, destitute of fortifications or garrisons, effectually oppose their entrance; the attempt would ensure destruction, and could only be dictated by absolute insanity: and nothing but the most flagrant destitution of justice could ever induce commanders to punish the bare submission to overwhelming force and violence, with the rigour and severity due to the perpetration of the highest species of crimes.

Suppose, for a moment, that a civil war raged in this country, which God forbid: suppose, further, that an army of five thousand men were to possess themselves, by force, of the city of Philadelphia.

*"Order of the lords justices and council to the earl of Ormonde. "By the lords justices and council, WM. PARSONS, Jo. BORLACE.

"The rebels having assembled themselves in arms in hostile manner, with banners displayed, in several places about this city of Dublin, intending and openly professing to starve this city and this. state, and his majesty's forces here, that so the rebels may the more easily possess themselves of the kingdom, deprive his majesty of his royal crown and sovereignty here, and root out, murder and destroy, all the British and Protestants in the kingdom,

"It is resolved, That it is fit that his lordship do endeavour with his majesty's forces to wound, kill, slay, and destroy, by all the ways and means he may, all the said rebels, and their adherents and relievers; and burn, spoil, waste, consume, destroy, and demolish, all the places, towns, and houses, where the said rebels are, or have been, relieved and harboured, and all the hay and corn there; and kill and destroy all the men there inhabiting able to bear arms!!!!

"Given at his majestie's castle of Dublin, 23d February, 1641-2. F. WILLOUGHBY,

THO. ROTHERAM, J. TEMPLE,

R. DILLON,

AD. LOFTUS,

744 Carte, III. 61.

ROBERT MEREDITH."744

745 Ibid.

What sentence would be pronounced on the commanders of the adverse armies, who, to punish submission to violence, which our citizens had not the means of preventing, should, after the expulsion of their enemies, order an indiscriminate slaughter of all those capable of bearing arms? Would they not deserve to expiate their guilt by the most cruel torments that human ingenuity could devise? This was precisely the spirit of the orders issued by the lords justices, who therefore merit to be ranked with the Neros, the Caligulas, the Domitians, and those other monsters, whose supreme delight was in the immolation of the human species.

This chapter being devoted merely to a review of the spirit with which the orders for war were issued on both sides, I reserve for a subsequent one a detail of the barbarous fidelity with which these horrible orders were carried into effect.

It must sicken every friend of mankind, to learn that the English parliament was actuated by the same nefarious spirit of slaughter of the Irish. It issued an ordinance, agreed upon after due deliberation, that "no quarter should be given to any Irishman or Papist born in Ireland ;" and that "they should be excepted out of all capitulations."* This horrible decree, worthy of a pandemonium of fallen angels, Lucifer president, and Belzebub secretary, attaches an eternal blot on

*"October, 24, 1644.

"An ordinance of the lords and commons assembled in parliament, commanding that no officer or soldier, either by sea or land, shall give any quarter to any Irishman, or to any Papist born in Ireland, which shall be taken in arms against the Parliament of England.

"The lords and commons assembled in the parliament of England do declare, that no quarter shall be given to any Irishman, or to any Papist born in Ireland, which shall be taken in hostility against the parliament, either upon the sea, or within this kingdom, or dominion of Wales!!! and therefore do order and ordain, that the lord general, lord admiral, and all other officers and commanders, both by sea and land, shall except all Irishmen, and all Papists born in Ireland, out of all capitulations, agreements, and compositions hereafter to be made with the enemy!!! and shall, upon the taking of every such Irishman or Papist born in Ireland as aforesaid, forthwith put every such person to death!!

"And it is further ordered and ordained, that the lord general, lord admiral, and the committees of the several counties, do give speedy notice hereof, to all subordinate officers and commanders, by sea and land respectively; who are hereby required to use their utmost care and circumspection, that this ordinance be duly executed; and lastly, the lords and commons do declare, that every officer and commander by sea or land, that shall be remiss or negligent in observing the tenor of this ordinance, shall be reputed a favourer of the bloody rebellion of Ireland, and shall be liable to such condign punishment as the justice of both houses of parliament shall inflict upon him."746

746 Rushworth, London, 1692, vol. V. page 783.
In a different edition this ordinance is in page

729.

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the escutcheons of the Hambdens, the Pyms, and the Essexes of that body, who, in their rancorous and remorseless hatred of Ireland and Irishmen, lost sight of every principle of humanity and justice, and of all the laws of civilized warfare.

The phraseology of this ordinance is very ambiguous, probably through design. It orders to be murdered,-for,

"Disguise it as we will,”

it is sheer, downright murder-it orders, I say, to be murdered "all Irishmen and Papists born in Ireland." The sweeping command to murder "all Irishmen," rendered it wholly unnecessary to add, "all Papists born in Ireland," unless they wished the world to believe, that a "Papist born in Ireland" was a species of being different from an "Irishman.”

To

cap the climax of this atrocious cruelty, and to guard against the goadings of

"The tyrant conscience,"

whereby their commanders might be tempted to yield to the dic

tates of

"Mercy! the brightest diadem of empire!

Mercy, that does distinguish men from brutes,"

they denounced "condign punishment" against all such as should be "remiss or negligent" in carrying the ordinance into execution. They were to be stigmatized with the foulest stain that the vocabulary of reproach could at that day furnish; that is, "to be reputed favourers of the bloody rebellion of Ireland," and to be punished accordingly.

While such a barbarous and murderous decree imprints its inextinguishable and sanguinary stain on the records of that parliament and party, it requires the most unblushing impudence and effrontery to continue the outrageous abuse of the Irish, for the pretended murders and massacres of far more Protestants than were in the kingdom all together.

The reader may perhaps flatter himself with the fond hope that these orders were not, nor intended to be, carried into operation. Let him not

"Lay this flattering unction to his soul."

A few pages hence, he will find that the sanguinary rulers found san guinary ruffians, to carry their sanguinary mandates into effect, in the true spirit of desolation in which they were conceived.

Far different was the spirit by which the calumniated Irish were actuated. They denounced at an early period of the war, the strongest sentence of excommunication not merely against murderers, but against thieves, spoilers, robbers, and extorters; as well as against all such as should favour, receive, or any way assist them; and, lest

"Articles agreed upon, ordained and concluded, in the general congregation, held at Kilkenny, May, 1642.

"We declare the [present] war, openly Catholic, to be lawful and just; in which war, if some of the Catholics be found to proceed out

this denunciation should prove ineffectual, they ordered their generals to punish offenders in the premises, under pain of interdiction. These orders are signed by three archbishops, four bishops, and twenty-one other dignitaries of the church, of various degrees. They were enacted in a grand council, held in Kilkenny, in May, 1642. What a glorious, what an honourable contrast for Ireland, between the spirit they display, and that of the murderous ordinance of the long parliament, that "no quarter should be given to any Irishman !" or that of the lords justices," to kill all the males able to bear arms, inhabiting in places where the rebels, (as they were falsely styled,) were harboured O, much-abused country! how little is the world acquainted with thy horrible sufferings! how inadequately does it appreciate thy real character! To what wretched historians has thy sad tale been confided! Will the justice of heaven never avenge thy wrongs, nor vindicate thy rights? Must centuries still roll on, and behold the countless blessings, which heaven has lavished, with liberal hand, on one of the fairest portions of the globe, blighted and blasted by a wretched policy, worthy only of ruthless eastern despotism?

of some particular and unjust title, covetousness, cruelty, revenge, or hatred, or any such unlawful, private intentions, we declare them therein grievously to sin, and therefore worthy to be punished and restrained with ecclesiastical censures, if (advised thereof) they do not amend."747

"We will and declare all those that murder, dismember, or griev ously strike; all thieves, unlawful spoilers, robbers of any goods, extorters; together with all such as favour, receive, or any ways assist them, to be excommunicated, and so to remain until they completely amend and satisfy, no less than if they were namely proclaimed excommunicated.

"We command all and every the generals, colonels, captains, and other officers of our Catholic army, to whom it appertaineth, that they severely punish all transgressors of our aforesaid command, touching murderers, maimers, strikers, thieves and robbers; and if they fail therein, we command the parish priests, curates, or chaplains respectively, to declare them interdicted; and that they shall be excommunicated, if they cause not due satisfaction to be made unto the commonwealth, and the party offended. And this the parish priests or chaplains shall observe, under pain of excommunication of sentence given ipso facto."748

747 Rusbworth, V. 516.

748 Idem, 519.

48

CHAPTER XXVII.

Cessation of hostilities. Furious and fanatical uproar. Thirst of blood and plunder. Arrant hypocrisy.

"Peace is the happy natural state of manWar his corruption, his disgrace."-Thompson.

THE war had raged for a considerable time with variety of success. Whatever considerable advantage had been gained on one side, was countervailed by some success on the part of the adversary. The Irish, goaded as we have seen, into insurrection by a combination of religious bigotry, national hatred, and devouring thirst of confiscation and plunder, were ardently desirous of a lasting peace, or at least of a cessation of hostilities, as a measure preparatory to peace. The war was carried on against them with the most ruthless ferocityThe sword made no distinction between age or sex: and whatever rapine could not carry off, the fire consumed.

To the king a cessation of hostilities was at least equally an object of ardent desire. The war, which fraud and falsehood and perjury had distorted into a horrible conspiracy for the destruction of the protestant religion in Ireland, was charged to his account and that of the queen, who were publicly denounced as its authors, with views to accomplish their purposes on England. He had therefore sent repeated orders to the duke of Ormonde, to agree to a cessation of hostilities, on such terms as would have been perfectly satisfactory to the insurgents, whose chief objects were, a limited toleration of the exercise of their religion, and security against the odious depredations on their estates, of which they and their ancestors had so long been the hapless victims.

The policy of the duke of Ormonde throughout the whole of the civil war, is truly inexplicable, and wears a most sinister aspect. He steadily enjoyed the complete confidence of Charles I. to whom he always professed a most devoted attachment. Yet under a variety of the most absurd pretences, he procrastinated, and threw numberless obstacles in the way of, the cessation, notwithstanding the most imperious orders of his royal master, to whom it was a vital object. When finally ratified, it was almost too late to answer any valuable purpose.

The fanatical and sanguinary spirit displayed in both kingdoms, when the cessation was proclaimed, is absolutely incredible. That benign measure, which must have been hailed with rapture by every good man in both countries, was received with as much execration and abhorrence, as if it were pregnant with destruction to the civil and religious liberties of the professors of the protestant religion throughout the British dominions. In the opposition to it were united a great variety of parties of very different views and principles-some of them merely deluded and misguided-others abandoned and wick

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