"Bill to explain and amend an Act in- or friar, or any secular clergyman not tituled an Act to prevent the further duly registered, £20: for discovering a growth of Popery." It was introduced by popish schoolteacher or tutor, £10. Any Mr. Sergeant Caulfield: was duly trans- two justices are also empowered to summitted to England by Wharton, was ap- mon before them any Papist over eighteen proved at once, and on its return was years, and examine him upon oath as to passed, of course. Its intention was chiefly the time and place he last heard Mass, and to close up any loophole of escape from the names of the parties present, as well the penalties of former statutes, and guard as concerning the residence of any Papist every possible access by which "Papists" priest or schoolmaster; and in case of the might still attain to independence or a witness refusing to testify there was a quiet life. Some, for example, had penalty of £20, or twelve months' imsecretly purchased annuities-by this prisonment. The informers were expected, statute, therefore, a Papist is declared in- after this, to be more diligent and devoted capable of holding or enjoying an annuity than ever; and a proclamation of the for life. It had been found, also, that same year ordering all registered priests paternal authority or filial affection had to take the abjuration oath before the prevented from its full operation that 25th of March, 1710, under the penalty of former act of 1704 which authorized præmunire, gave additional stimulus and a child, on conforming, to reduce his opportunity to the discoverers. The trade father to a tenant for life. Further en- of "priest-hunting" now became a discouragement to children seemed desirable: tinct branch of the profession; and many therefore by this new law, upon the con- a venerable clergyman was dogged by version of the child of any Catholic, the these bloodhounds, through various dischancellor was to compel the father to guises, and waylaid by night on his way discover upon oath the full value of his to baptize or confirm or visit the dying. estate, real and personal; and thereupon The captured clergy were sometimes make an order for the independent sup- brought in by batches of four and five; port of such conforming child, and for and the laws were rigorously put in force: securing to him, after his father's death, if it was a first offence they were transsuch share of the property as to the court ported; but if any bishop who had once should seem fit: also to secure jointures been transported was caught in Ireland to popish wives who should desert their again, he was hanged. Such is the main husbands' faith. Thus distrust and dis- substance of the act for "explaining and cord and heartburning in every family amending," generally called the Second were well provided for. One clause of Act "to prevent the further growth of the Act prohibits a Papist from teaching, Popery." Lord Wharton, by commission, as tutor or usher, even as assistant to a gave it the royal assent; and for the zeal Protestant schoolmaster; and another he had shown in recommending and offers a salary of £30 to such popish priests hastening the Act, the House of Comas should conform. But one thing was still mons voted his lordship an address, wanting: it was known that, notwithstand-"gratefully acknowledging her majesty's ing the previous banishment of Catholic most particular care of them in appointar hbishops, bishops, &c., there were still men in the kingdom exercising those functions, coming from France and from Spain, and braving the terrible penalties of transportation and death, in order to keep up the indispensable connection of the Catholic flock with the Head of the Church. It was known that this was indeed an absolute necessity, at whatsoever risk; and that to pretend a toleration of Catholic wor-known character given of him by Dean ship while the hierarchy was banished, was as reasonable as to talk of tolerating Presbyterianism without Presbyterians, or courts without judges, or laws or juries. Therefore, this Act for "explaining and amending," assigned stated rewards to informers for the discovery of an archbishop, bishop, vicar-general, or other person exercising ecclesiastical jurisdiction. For such a prize the informer was to have £50: for discovering any monk ing his excellency their chief governor, and earnestly wishing his long continuance in the government," &c. His excellency desired the speaker to inform them "that he was extremely well pleased and satisfied." Than this Lord Wharton no more profligate politician, no more detestable man, had ever been sent over to rule in Ireland. It is true that the well Swift must be taken with some allowance; because Wharton was a Whig, had been a Dissenter, and was still favourable to relaxation of the code against Dissenters. These circumstances were quite enough to rouse all the furious ire of the Dean of St. Patrick's, and draw from him a torrent of his foulest abuse. Besides, if the dean was enraged agaist Lord Wharton, it certainly was not for his tyranny to the Catholics, but rather for his partiality to (who are only the vulgar, and some gentlemen who live in the Irish parts of the kingdom), but the English colonies, who are three parts in four, are much more civilized than many counties in England," &c. Much will have to be said concerning Swift and his labours, a few years later in the narrative. For the present it is enough to point out that his furious denunciation of Lord Wharton and his administration in Ireland was by no means on account of that nobleman's urging on the bill for crushing Papists. the Dissenters: whereby, indeed, as we this kingdom and the savage old Irish shall see, Wharton soon got into great disfavour with that very Parliament which had lately praised him so highly. Jonathan Swift had already lived many years in Ireland, first as vicar of Kilroot near Carrickfergus, and afterwards (in 1699) as Rector of Agher and Rector of Laracor and Rathbeggan, in the diocese of Meath. He did not become Dean of St. Patrick's till 1713; nor much concern himself with Irish politics till several years later: but he was a country clergyman in Ireland during all the period of the enactment of the whole penal code, Lord Wharton had been brought up a both in William's reign and in Anne's; he Dissenter; though he had long ceased to was himself witness to the ferocious exe- regard any form of religion, or any tie of cution of those laws, and the bitter suffer- morality. He was, however, a Whig, and ing and humiliation of the Catholic people by party connections in England, was under them; yet neither then, nor at any favourable to some relaxation of penal later time, not even when in the full tide laws against the Irish Presbyterians. In of his fame and popularity as a "patriot," his speech proroguing this Parliament of did he ever breathe one syllable of re- 1709, he said to the Houses that "he monstrance, or of censure against those made no question but they understood too laws. Swift is called an Irish patriot, and well the true interest of the Protestant he was so, if zealous vindication of the religion in that kingdom not to endeavour claim of the English colony to rule the to make all Protestants as eas as they nation, and to be the nation, together with could, who were willing to contribute utter and acrimonious disdain of the great what they could to defend the whole mass of the people and total indifference against the common enemy." But the to their grievous wrongs, can constitute a majority of the Irish Commons belonged patriot. But in truth the history of this to the Tory party; and very soon disextraordinary genius is a signal illustra-sensions and jealousies arose between tion of the position already stated-that them and the lord-lieutenant, on account in Ireland were two nations, and that to of his obvious bias in favour of the Disbe a patriot for the one was to be a mortal senters. The government of England enemy to the other. The period of Dean also soon came into the hands of the Swift's leadership in Irish (Colonial) Tory party through a series of intrigues politics had not yet arrived; and all his regarding foreign politics, which are not writings upon Irish affairs are dated after necessary to be here detailed: and on the his appointment to the deanery: but it 7th Nov., 1711, the English Lords and may be stated once for all, that this "Irish Commons made a long address to the patriot" never once, in his voluminous queen, complaining of Wharton for "havworks and correspondence, called himself ing abused her majesty's name, in orderan Irishman, but always an Englishman; ing nolle prosequi to stop proceedings that he sought preferment only in Eng- againts one Fleming and others for disland, where he wished to live with the turbing the peace of the town of "wits" at Button's coffee-house; that when Drogheda by setting up a meeting-house" named to the Dublin deanery he quitted-a thing not seen in Drogheda, they say, London with a heavy heart, to come over for many years. They further comto his "exile in Ireland," over which he plained, in this Address, of Presbyterians, mourned in his letters as pathetically as "for tyranny in threatening and ruining Ovid exiled to Tomi; that he never, in all members who left them; in denying the the numerous publications he issued on common offices of Christianity; in printIrish affairs, gave one word or hint betray-ing and publishing that the 'Sacramental ing the least consciousness or suspicion of Test is only an engine to advance a any injustice being done to the Catholics: State faction, and to debase religion to and lastly, that far from feeling any com- serve mean and unworthy purposes.' munity of race or of interest with the Irish, They therefore recommended that her we find him thus expressing himself in majesty should withdraw the yearly bouna letter to his friend Mr. Pope, in 1737:ty of £1200, then allowed to Dissenting "Some of those who highly esteem Ministers-the small beginning of that you are grieved to find you make no dis- regium donum, or royal bounty, which has tinction between the English gentry of been gradually much increased, to recon cile the Presbyterians somewhat to their the number of Dissenters "-which in Dr. disabilities under the Test law. During Swift's eyes was as bad as increasing the all the rest of this reign, and the three number of Papists. Accordingly, he infollowing, no representations on the part dicates his opinion of the whole scheme of the Dissenters of the injustice of this a little lower down, where he says, "It law, and no protestations of their loyalty appeared manifestly, by the issue, that the to the English crown and House of Han-public was a loser by every individual over, availed in the least to procure a relaxation of the odious Test. Their efforts in this direction only drew upon them, a few years later, the savage raillery of Swift, who maintained that the very Papists were quite as well entitled to relief as they. amongst them; and that a kingdom can no more be the richer for such an importtation than a man can be fatter by a wen." The law for naturalisation of Protestants was in fact soon repealed; though no measures were spared to drive the Catholics away. And even such of the Roman Catholic natives as were afterwards willing to return, were not permitted; for in 1713 the Commons ordered that "an address should be made to her majesty, to desire that she would be pleased not to grant licenses to Papists to return into the kingdom." Papists that were or should presume to come into the galleries." The Palatines, or their descendants, still remain in Ireland. They generally "conformed;" not having any particular objection against any religion; but caring little for the Ascendency, or the Whig or Tory politics of the country, at least for a generation or two. It was in this year, 1709, that the scheme originated, of inducing Protestant foreigners to come to Ireland, and of offering them naturalisation. Accordingly, on the request of certain lords, and others of the council, eight hundred and seventy-one Protestant Palatine families from Germany were brought over, and the sum of It was even dangerous for them to £24.850, 5s. 6d. appointed for their main- attempt, or endeavour to hear what passed tenance out of the revenue, on a resolu- in the House of Commons concerning tion of the Commons "that it would themselves. For in the same year, an much contribute to the security of the order was made there, "that the sergeantkingdom if the said Palatines were en-at-arms should take into custody all couraged and settled therein." The German families actually were settled as tenants and labourers in various parts of the country. The scheme of the framers of this measure "seems to have been," says Dr. Curry, "to drive the Roman Catholic natives out of the kingdom, which effect it certainly produced in great numbers;" but the plan was not found to answer so far as the Germans themselves The Duke of Shrewsbury was lord-lieuwere concerned. They were neither zeal-tenant after Wharton. The duke had deous for the queen's service nor for the ascendency of the Anglican Church. It seems that only four, out of this great body enlisted in her majesty's army, though she was then engaged in a war with France, the very power which had ravaged their Palatinate, and left them homeless. The lords, in an address to the queen in 1711, complain of "that load of debt which the bringing over numbers of useless and indigent Palatines had brought apon them." As for Dean Swift and the Tories, the way in which the German im-chancellor, because he was a noted Tory migration was regarded by them is apparent from a passage in the Dean's History of the Four Last Years of Queen Anne." He says, "By this Act, any foreigner who would take the oaths to the Government, and profess himself a Protestant, of whatsover denomination, was immediately naturalised, and had all the advantages of an English-born subject, at the expense of a shilling. Most Protestants abroad differ from us in the points of church government, so that all the acquisitions by this Act would increase serted the Catholic Church, and, like other converts, was more bitter against the communion he had left than those who were born Protestants. He was also a Tory. The Irish Parliament was dissolved; and on a new election, the majority of the members were found to be Whigs. The short remainder of this reign, so far as affairs of State in Ireland are concerned, is quite barren of interest, the great affair being a quarrel of the House of Commons against Sir Constantine Phipps, the lord and close friend of the celebrated Doctor Sacheverell, the clergyman who preached the divine right of kings, and was therefore held an enemy to the "glorious Revolution," and friend of the "Pretender." All these matters were quite unimportant to the great body of the nation. The Catholics were either emigrating to France, or else withdrawing themselves as much as possible from observation; some of them conforming and changing their names; others reduced to the most Commons Journ., Vol. III. pitiful artifices in order to preserve the little patrimony that was left in their hands; but most of them sinking into the condition of tenants or labourers in the country (all profitable industry in the towns being prohibited to them); and it is from this time forward that thousands of the ancient gentry of the country, and even chiefs of powerful clans, stripped of their dignities and possessions, and too poor, or too old to emigrate, had to descend to the position of cotters and serfs under the new possessors of the land, who hated and oppressed them, both as despoiled Irish and as proscribed Catholics; and who hate them quite as bitterly to the present hour. bitterly displeased at the "Protestant succession," now secured by law to the House of Hanover. It is needless here to enter into the controversy as to whether she was altogether a stranger to the plots for setting aside that succession, and bringing in her Catholic brother. She was known to be deeply grieved and provoked by the zeal of politicians, both in England and Ireland, who, desirous of gaining favour with the coming dynasty, endeavoured to get an act of attainder passed against the Pretender ;" and a bill for that purpose in Ireland, which also offered a large reward for his apprehension, was only defeated by a hasty prorogation. Yet "the queen hated and despised the Pretender, to my knowledge," is the assertion of Swift in his "Remarks on Burnet's History." Perhaps she did: most sovereigns hate their heirs-apparent, even. when these are their own sons; but there is abundant evidence that she hated the Elector of Hanover and his mother very In the mean time, the war of the Allies against France had been attended with many brilliant successes under the Duke of Marlborough and Prince Eugene. Some of the most signal defeats ever sustained by the arms of France were inflicted by the duke, particularly Blenheim, Ramillies, Oudenarde, and Mal- much worse. plaquet. But on the Court revolution which displaced the Whigs, Marlborough was deprived of his command and the Duke of Ormond sent out in his place. Shortly afterwards the Peace of Utrecht was signed (11th April, 1713), by which treaty France recognized the Protestant succession in England, and the "Pretender" was compelled to depart from that kingdom; the union of the two monarchies of France and Spain was provided against, though a French Bourbon remained on the throne of Spain; and to the great loss and humiliation of France, it was agreed that the harbour of Dunkirk should be demolished. This treaty gave repose for a time to the Irish soldiers abroad. The last year of Anne, therefore, was a year of peace abroad, but of violent party strife and political conspiracy at home. All the world expected a struggle for the succession at the moment of the Queen's death; and King James the Third, called in England "Pretender," was known to have a large party both in that country and in Scotland, ready to assert his hereditary right. The agitation extended to Ireland; but did not reach the Catholic population, which was quite indifferent to Stuart or Hanoverian. The queen died on the 1st of August, 1714, the last of the house of Stuart recognized as sovereign of England, and leaving behind her, as to her Irish administration, so black a record that it would have been strange indeed if the Irish nation had ever desired to see the face of a Stuart again. Yet it is probable that she was secretly a Catholic, like all her family and it is certain that she was : CHAPTER VII. 1714-1723. George I.-James III-Perils of Dean Swift.— THE succession of the Elector of Hanover proclamation was made by torchlight, and English Parliament met, articles of im at midnight; and great efforts were made peachment were quickly found against the to produce the impression that there was Duke of Ormond, and the Lords Oxford imminent danger of a Jacobite insurrection and Bolingbroke, for high treason, in "to bring in the Pretender." This affec- having contributed to bring about the tation of alarm seems to have been in- Peace of Utrecht by traitorous means, tended to bring odium, not so much on and with a view of changing the Prothe Catholics, as on the Tories: some testant succession. Bolingbroke and Orarrests were made, and it was alleged that mond avoided the trial on the impeachon one of the parties arrested letters were ment by going to the continent, where found written by Dr. Swift. The popu- they both offered their services to King lace of Dublin must at that period have James III. (or the Pretender), then been violently Hanoverian; for Lord holding a kind of court in Lorrain, Orrey tells us that on the dean's return having been exiled from France at the to Ireland after the proclamation of the peace. The party which adhered to the new king, he dared hardly venture forth, exiled prince was, in fact, making urgent and was pelted by mobs when he made his preparations for a rising both in Scotland appearance. The bitterness and fury of and in England; and on the 15th of Sepparty spirit at that day is curiously illus-tember, 1715, the Earl of Mar set up the trated by the story of the outrages and standard of insurrection, proclaimed King insults which the dean had to encounter, James the Third at Castletown in Scoteven at the hands of persons of rank and land, and quickly collected an army of title. Lord Blaney attempted to drive ten thousand men. These forces were over him on the public road; and Swift gathered from both Highlands and Lowpetitioned the legislature for protection to lands, and consisted both of Catholics and his life. He was advised by his physician, Protestants. The Duke of Argyle, with he said, to go often on horseback, on his powerful clan of Campbells, was account of his health; "and there being zealous for King George, and with other no place in winter so convenient for riding Highland tribes and some regular troops as the strand towards Howth, your pe- met the Earl of Mar at Sheriffmuir, where titioner takes all opportunities that his a bloody but indecisive battle took place. business or the weather will permit to A portion of the Jacobite force, marched take that road." Here he details the southward into England, were encountered scene of Lord Blaney's attempting to at Preston, in Lancashire, by the King's overturn him and his horse, at the same troops, and, after a short fight, obliged to time threatening his life with a loaded surrender at discretion. Mar still kept pistol, and prays protection accordingly. his banner displayed until King James the There is no doubt, however (without ques- Third in person landed at Peterhead, on tioning the sincerity of the dean's zeal for the east coast of Scotland, in December; the House of Hanover), that several of his but very soon afterwards, on the approach most intimate friends, especially Lord of Argyle with a superior force, the enterBolingbroke and Bishop Atterbury, were prise was abandoned. The Prince and the engaged in the plot, along with the Duke Earl of Mar escaped by sea; the other of Ormond, to prevent the succession of leaders of the insurrection, both in EngKing George; and that the suspicions as land and in Scotland, were arrested, tried, to Swift's Jacobitism were at least plau- and some of them executed. The rebellion sible. Swift was excessively mortified, or was at an end, and from that day the rather irritated, by the popular manifes-exiled Prince may truly be termed, not tations against him. He was very covetous of influence and popularity, and his high, fierce spirit could ill brook the least demonstration of public reproach. He denounced the people of Dublin as a vile, abandoned race; but we hear no more of nis Jacobitism, and not much of his Toryism, except that to the last hour of his life he hated and lampooned Dis senters. Immediately after the accession of George I., all Tories were instantly dismissed from office, and the Government placed entirely in the hands of Whigs; which had been the very object of denouncing Tories as Jacobites. When the D James the Third, but the "Pretender.” This Scottish insurrection is of small moment to Irish history, save in so far as it furnished a pretext for fresh atrocities upon the unresisting people. There was no insurrection or disturbance whatever during all these events. We do not even hear of any Irish officer of distinction who came from the continent to join the Pretender's cause in Scotland; and the Earl of Mar, who afterwards published a narration in Paris, affirms that the Duke of Berwick, who was very popular with the Irish troops in France, had been urged to take the chief command of the movement, probably in order to draw some |