CHAPTER VI.

THE REIGN OF JAMES I. A.D. 1603 TO A.D. 1625.

THE accession of King James of Scotland to the English throne was hailed with cordial satisfaction by the native Irish; and, at the commencement of his reign, he stood high in their estimation. According to their views, it was no slight recommendation to him that some of his remote ancestors had flourished in their own green isle, and that he traced his descent from a long line of Hibernian monarchs.1 The Roman Catholics had been led to believe that the son of Mary Stuart-so long the hope of their Church—was not unfriendly to their religion.2 Acting under this impression, or determined at all hazards to make an effort in favour of their creed, they no sooner heard of Elizabeth's demise than they proceeded to restore their worship in all its splendour in a number of the leading towns of Leinster and Munster.3 The priests, arrayed in official costume, appeared accordingly in public, walking ostentatiously in processions: the monas

1 See Cambrensis Eversus, iii. 53-67.

Before his elevation to the English throne he had been coquetting with the Pope, and endeavouring to persuade the Romish party that he was not indisposed to look with favour on the religion of his mother. See An Historical and Critical Account of his Life and Writings, by William Harris. London, 1772, pp. 19, 29, 104.

3 Though the open country had been sadly desolated by the wars of Desmond aud O'Neill, many of the towns of Munster had meanwhile been enriched. Large sums of money had been sent there from England to pay the soldiers, and the inhabitants sold provisions to the belligerents at exorbitant prices. See Pacata Hibernia, Part i., p. 196.

teries, which had been converted to civil uses, were seized and re-occupied; and mass was celebrated in churches from which the legal ministers were expelled. But the LordDeputy Mountjoy promptly interfered, and repressed these symptoms of insubordination. Marching southwards, he found the gates of Waterford closed against him; and the inhabitants-who pleaded the provisions of a charter of King John—at first refused to admit his soldiers. His menaces— to which his well-known decision of character imparted a most emphatic significance-soon induced them to give way. A strong garrison was stationed in their city; they renounced all foreign jurisdiction; and once more recognized the ascendency of Protestantism. Cork, Cashel, Clonmel, Limerick, and other towns in which Romanism had been re-established, were intimidated, and restored to submission. Immediately afterwards, an Act of oblivion and indemnity was published, announcing a free pardon to all who had committed offences against the Crown until the time of his Majesty's accession; liberating the whole of the Irish "churls," or peasantry, from the capricious tyranny of the chieftains; and admitting them, on the same terms as the other subjects of the kingdom, to the protection and benefits of the constitution.2

This Act of oblivion and indemnity was well fitted to promote social order; but the question of religion continued to create perplexity and confusion. The Irish Protestant Establishment still presented a melancholy spectacle. Al

1 Leland, ii. 413. Fynes Moryson's History of Ireland, ii. 317, 322. An account of the proceedings at Waterford and elsewhere, by James White, Vicar Apostolic of Waterford and Lismore, who himself acted a prominent part on the occasion, may be found in Duffy's Irish Catholic Magazine, vol. ii. 271-275, 296302. Dublin, 1848. White states that, after the Romanists had been obliged to give up the churches, "the priests celebrated low and solemn masses with full liberty in private houses, preached to the people, and discharged all the other functions of their holy ministry," down to the date of his departure from Ireland on the 18th of November, 1603. It appears that White at this time, when referring publicly to the demise of Elizabeth, informed the citizens that "Jezebel was dead." King, p. 851. Respecting White, see also Leland, ii. 415, note MacNevin's Confis. of Ulster, p. 14, note.

2 Cox, Part ii. 8; Leland, ii. 416.

most all the churches had long been in a state of decay: many of them were now unroofed and unfit for worship;1 and their desolation only too truly indicated the spiritual condition of the community around them. According to the testimony of an intelligent contemporary, who held a high official position in the country,2 the bishops were as "priests of Jeroboam, taken out of the basest of the people, more fit to sacrifice to a calf than to intermeddle with the religion of God." One of them, lately deceased, had been "a poor singing man void of knowledge of his grammar rules ;" and his successor was "of like insufficiency." Another, who held three bishoprics, was "utterly unlearned." There was "not one able preacher in all the province (of Munster), nor three sufficient bishops in all the kingdom." As a body, the parochial clergy were no better than the lords spiritual. "The Churchmen for the most part throughout the kingdom," says Sir John Davys, "were such as could not read; and yet the most of them, whereof many were serving-men, and some horse-boys, were not without two or three benefices apiece; nevertheless, for all their pluralities, they were most of them beggars; for the patron, or ordinary, or some of their friends, took the greater part of their profits by a plain contract before their institution; so that many gentlemen and some women, and some priests and Jesuits, have the greatest

1 Sir John Davys, who held the office of Attorney-General for Ireland in this reign, says :-"The churches are ruined and fallen, and down to the ground, in all parts of the kingdom. There is no divine service, no christening of children, no receiving of the sacrament, no Christian meeting or assembly, no not once in a year." -Calendar of State Papers, James I., 1606-8. Preface, p. 55.

2 Justice Saxey.

3 Calendar of State Papers of the reign of James I., 1606-8. Preface, p. 55. London, 1874. The reader must recollect that Miler Magrath, Archbishop of Cashel, still survived. In 1610 he obtained William Knight as his coadjutor. Cotton's Fasti, i. 12. The coadjutor seems to have been also a person of worthless character. A contemporary says: "McGrath is still alive, extremely old and bed-rid; cursed by the Protestants for wasting the revenues and manors of the ancient See of Cashel, and derided by the Catholics, who are well acquainted with the drunken habits of himself and his coadjutor Knight."-MEEHAN'S Rise and Fall of the Irish Franciscan Monasteries, p. 81. Dublin, 1869.

benefit of our benefices, though these poor unlettered clerks bear the name of incumbents." "1

Under such circumstances, it was not wonderful that the Romish clergy maintained a firm hold on the sympathy and confidence of the people. Though the priests were sunk in superstition, they kept up at least "a form of godliness;" and some of them, by their fastings and other austerities, had acquired a high reputation for sanctity. In the present wretched position of the Protestant Church they were peculiarly formidable. They could speak the native tongueused almost exclusively everywhere beyond the pale; many of them had been educated in seminaries on the Continent, where their hatred to England was fostered, and their bigotry intensified; a few of them, scattered all over the island, were well supplied with the most popular arguments against Protestantism; they were trained in the chicanery of the Jesuits; and their hopes of ecclesiastical promotion depended on the success of rebellion. Their general knowledge was very limited; they were grossly ignorant of Scripture; their manners were coarse; and their moral conduct was far from irreproachable: but the multitude to whom they ministered had been long accustomed to estimate character according to a very low standard; so that little scandal was created by their habitual profanity or their incorrigible drunkenness. They had been taught to regard sedition as patriotism, and to honour as martyrs of the Church such of their brethren as had been punished for disloyalty. Their readiness to encounter danger for the sake of their religion attested their sincerity, and awakened the admiration of their countrymen. Had they quietly availed themselves of the imperfect toleration they enjoyed, it might have been enlarged and at length legalized; but the more ambitious spirits among them were determined to be satisfied with nothing less than their ancient

1 Calendar of State Papers, James I., 1606-8. Preface, pp. 54, 55. Sir John Davys, in his letter "touching the state of Monaghan, Fermanagh, and Cavan,” written in 1607, says: "At this day the Pope doth collate unto them (all dignities in cathedral churches and all benefices of value), and until this day the parsons presented have enjoyed the benefices in this mere Irish country by colour of the Pope's collation."

ascendency. Thus it was that the country was kept in constant alarm by their political plottings. Their incessant activity, and their treasonable correspondence with France, Italy, and Spain, did not escape the notice of the administration; and it was eventually deemed necessary to take very decided steps to check their proceedings..

At this time there was no enactment in the Irish statutebook which could give much annoyance to the mass of the Roman Catholic population. The Oath of Supremacy could be legally tendered only to a limited number of persons; and government officials often had instructions not to press it on Roman Catholic noblemen and gentlemen of admitted loyalty. A shilling a Sunday for absence from the Established worship was the only penalty to which ordinary Romanists were liable; and, during the whole of the reign of Elizabeth, this fine was rarely exacted.1 But, early in the reign of James I., a new and less tolerant policy was inaugurated. The priests-especially those trained abroad-appear to have provoked this severity. They were the ringleaders in the recent revolt of the cities of Munster. They sometimes created much confusion by breaking up matrimonial engagements, and by uniting in wedlock to other parties persons thus illegally divorced. They inveighed in their sermons against the Government; stirred up opposition to its arrangements; excommunicated jurors who returned verdicts favourable to the Crown; and induced wives to refuse to cohabit with husbands inclined to conformity. They assailed with peculiar malignity any ministers of the Establishment who were honestly labouring to advance the interests of Protestantism.

In

1 66 By the Court Rolls," says a correspondent of Sir James Mackintosh in 1810, "I find she (Elizabeth) had her high Ecclesiastical Commissioners who occasionally punished for not attending divine service. But this was rare; no more than two or three instances during her reign."—Calendar of State Papers, James I., 1606-8. Preface, p. 104, note.

2 It was in consequence proposed to make a law that any priest "separating and divorcing man and wife" should be judged a felon.-Calendar of Carew MSS., 1603-1624, p. 158. London, 1873. A law legalizing marriages condemned by the Church of Rome had been made in 1542. It is the 33rd of Henry VIII., chap. vi.

3 Calendar of State Papers, James I., 1606-8, pp. 586, 507, 526. Preface, p. 88.