then alive, were enabled to become members of parliament. The fanatical mob, that had rabbled the epifcopal clergy, were armed, and made the guard of this meeting of the eftates, and refolved to facrifice any who durft oppofe their defigns. They attacked the Archbishop of Glafgow in the ftreets of Edinburgh where the convention fate." b "On the 31st of May 1689, King William fent inftructions to Duke Hamilton, commiffioner, in these words: "You are to pass an act, turning the meeting of the estates into a parliament, and the three estates are to confift of the noblemen, barons and burgeffes." Accordingly, the meeting, where the bifhops formerly fate, was on the 5th of June, 1689, turned into a parliament, the bishops being first excluded. Two days after, that parliament passed an act settling presbyterian church-government, and on the 22d of July following abolifhed epifcopacy. This was done in confequence of new inftructions fent to Duke Hamilton in these words: " you are to touch the act abolishing episcopacy, as foon as you can; and to refcind all acts inconfiftent therewith." Thefe inftructions were figned by the King, at Whitehall, July 17th, 1689, and the act was touched at Edinburgh, on the 22d of the fame month; and thus fell epifcopacy in Scotland, two months and eleven days after King William and Mary took her aged father from the murderers; they even mangled the dead body; they at length left the torn carcase with every mark of indignity on the high way. Men were fhocked at an enthusiasm that gave the name of a religious action to the worst of crimes. An univerfal joy followed the murder of Sharp among the adherents of the covenant, the pulpits thundered forth the applause of the affaffins, and even fome, who approved not of the manner of the deed, expreffed their gladness at the removal of the arch enemy of their forms." Macphers. Hift. of Great Britain, vol. i. p. 272. "The blow (fays Macpherson) which the royal prerogative received in Scotland, in the memorable 1688, eftablished licenciousness, instead of freedom in that kingdom. The parliament was placed in a fituation to make the moft for themselves, at the hands of the king, while the people felt nothing from the alteration in government, but a change of tyrants." Hift. of Great Britain, vol. ii. p. 332. took upon them the crown of that kingdom, which was the 11th of May, 1689." C The true caufe of the decline of the protestant religion in Ireland in the reign of king James II. THE decline of the protestant religion in Ireland, in the reign of king James, was not owing, as Dr. King fuppofes, either to the violence of his government, or the artifice, or induftry of his priests; but to the negligence at first, and afterwards to the felfinterestedness and tergiverfation of its own clergy. Of their negligence,' Lord Clarendon himself frequently complained, State Lett. vol. i. p. 215. "They were printed at London, by order of King William, ann. 1689; and the Scots acts of convention and parliament, above quoted, are collected and extracted from the registers and records of the meeting of eftates and parliament there by the commiffioner, then exercifing the office of clerk-register, and printed Cum Privilegio at Edinburgh, ann. 1690." Lelley, ib. "By an act made in Scotland in 1695, epifcopal ministers were prohibited to baptize or folemnize matrimony, in pain of perpetual imprisonment, but repealed 10th of Queen Anne, and no perfon to incur any penalty for reforting to epifcopal meetings, nor their pastors for preaching, adminiftering the facraments or marrying." Summary of penal Laws, p. 79. "I did not find (fays Marthal Schomberg, in a letter to King William, from Lifburn, December, 1689), that the minifters apply themselves enough to their duty; whilft the Romifh priests are paffionate to exhort the people to die for the church of Rome, and in putting themselves at their head." Dalrymp. Mem. vol. iii. p. 59. In one of these letters, he tells his grace, "that very few of the clergy refided in their cures; but employed pitiful curates, which neceffitated the people to look after a Romish priest, or a non-conformist preacher, of both which there was plenty. That he found it an ordinary thing in Ireland for a minifter to ..have five or fix, or more cures, and to get them supplied by those who complained, in his letters to the Archbishop of Canterbury, whom, as I have already obferved, the king had ordered him to confult, in all the religious affairs of that kingdom. And the effects of that negligence, together with the enfuing war (for which religion was the pretence) were fuch, that Mr. Lefley fays, "he was himself a witness, that atheism, contempt of all religion, debauchery, and violence, were more notorious and univerfal, in the protestant army in Ireland, from the year 1688 to 1692, and more publicly owned, than fince he knew the world. That to his knowledge, feveral had turned papifts, on account of the lewdness of 2 Ubi fupra, p. 36-7-8. the who will do it cheapest. When (adds he) I discourse with my lords the bishops on these things, I confess, I have not fatisfactory answers." Dalrymp. Memoirs, vol. i. p. 223. Even Marfhal Schomberg complained to King William in 1690, "that the (established) clergy of Ireland were people, that were little attached to their parishes." Ib. vol. ii. Append. p. 79. Lord Clarendon complained in 1685-6, "that several of the clergy were absent in England; and among these the Archbishop of Tuam, and the Bishop of Down and Connor: that the former, after three years abfence, was refolved to come home; but that the latter, who had been abfent from his charge fix years, defired to have his licence of abfence renewed; and that yet, it was really a fhame to think how his diocess lay." State Lett. vol. i. p. 215. "Some (clergymen) fays his lordship, hold five, fix or nine hundred pounds per annum in ecclefiaftical preferments, and get them all ferved for one hundred and fifty pounds a year, and do not preach once a year themselves. Several of the clergy, who have been in England, fent to renew their licences of absence, but I have refused most of them, which has brought some of them home, and the reft must follow." Ib. p. 215. In the journals of the house of commons, October 1695, there is a petition of Peter Aris, Thomas Baker, Richard Adams, and other inhabitants of the parish of Newcastle in the county of Wicklow, complaining that they have had no fervice in their parifh-church fince the troubles (1688) though their church be in good repair, and at least three hundred proteftants in the faid parish; under colour of an union to the parish of Delgany, though in truth there was no fuch union; prefented to the house and read." Vol. ii. f. 728. the army, and the apoftacy of the clergy. And that, however it might seem a paradox, it was nevertheless true, that there had been more converts to popery in England alfo, and from the fame caufes, within the four years above-mentioned, than in four years before that period." That is to fay, more in the four years after King James's abdication, when he could make ufe of neither force nor allurements to gain converts to his religion, than in all the time that he had it fo amply in his power, to employ both thefe means of converfion for that purpose." Bishop Burnet has accounted for this fudden growth of irreligion and immorality, at that juncture, in the fame manner. "A difbelief," fays he,' " of revealed religion, a profane mockery of the christian faith, and the mysteries of it, became fcandalous and avowed; and it must be confeffed, that the behaviour of many clergymen gave atheifts no fmall advantage. They had taken the oaths to, and read the prayers for the present government; they obferved the orders for public fafts and thanksgivings; and yet they fhewed in many places, their averfion to our establishment too visibly. This made many conclude that the clergy were a fort of men, that would fwear and pray, even against their confciences rather than lose their benefices; and by confequence, that they were governed by interest, not by principle. Upon the whole matter, the nation was falling into a general corruption, both as to morals and principles; and that was fo much spread among all forts of people, that it gave us great apprehenfions of heavy judgments from Heaven." 3 Hift. of his own Times, vol. ii. Queen A late ingenious writer obferves, " that the number of Roman catholics did not increafe when they had the particular favour of the court. From the diffolution of the Oxford parliament to the end of the reign of James II. none embraced their doctrine but a very few perfons, who were called court catholics, and they after the revolution all returned to the profeflion of the proteftant religion, except Mr. Dryden (the great poet)." Confideration on the Penal Laws against Roman Catholics, p. 66. Queen Mary, in a letter to King William, July 1690, has these remarkable words, " I must put you in mind of one thing, believing it now the feafon (the king was then in Ireland), which is, that you would take care of the church in Ireland. Every body agrees, that it is the worst in Christendom." + The perplexity of the established clergy of Ireland after the coronation of King William. THE ftrange verfatility, and trimming behaviour of the Irish established clergy on this occafion, is thus freely defcribed by Mr. Lelley.'" Before the affociation in the north, they prayed for King James; in the beginning of March following, they proclaimed the Prince of Orange king, and prayed for him. On the 14th of that month, King James's army broke their forces at Dromore, in the north of Ireland; then they prayed again for King James, that God might strengthen him to vanquish and overcome all his enemies; in Auguft following, Schomberg came over with an English army; then, as far as his quarters reached, they returned to pray the fame prayer for King William, the reft of the proteftants ftill praying for victory to King James. And yet they say, that, all that while, they all meant the fame thing; four times in one year, praying backward and forward, point blank contradictory to one another. The bishop of Meath in his fpeech at the head and in name of the proteftant clergy of Dublin, took pains to clear himself and them to king William, from having been fo much as trimmers to king James, while he was among them; that is, they were his inveterate enemies. Yet his lordfhip was one of the lords spiritual mentioned in the addrefs of the parliament of Ireland to that king, on the 10th of May, 1689; in which Dalrymp. Mem. vol. iii. p. 154. Anfw. to King, p. 108. 2 Id. ib. p. 103 |