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Catholics, who then indisputably composed the country or natural party in that kingdom, and which had under his successor been strengthened and encouraged, particularly by Strafford and Ormond, with the same view of bearing down the Catholics as a common enemy, was generally infected with the Puritanical fanaticism of that day: the real concomitant of which was an antibasilican spirit, that soon after demonstrated itself in the subversion of the constitution. Both those monarchs would, from their natural disposition, have effectually crushed that party at home, though they consented to use them as the instruments of opposing the Catholics in a distant kingdom, who were then, from their property as well as numbers, the great bulk and natural interest of the Irish nation. This factitious power finding their strength in their ascendency over the Catholics, soon seized the opportunity of availing themselves of their success, and were amongst the most forward and violent in opposing the regal power of Charles, whilst they continued for some years to disguise their disloyalty to the throne, under the imposing veil of zeal for the altar. A forward and active hatred of Popery gave claims in Ireland, which not only commanded favour, but absolved from punishment. In the days of Charles the First, this spirit anticipated the breaking out of Cromwell's rebellion; in the days of Charles the Second, it survived the restoration of monarchy; under Charles the Second, under William and Mary, under Anne, were remunerations voted by parliament to the descendants of Cromwellian rebels, for the forward zeal and services of their ancestors in that cause. In the year 1800, the Earl of Clare declared in the House of Peers, that it would have been an act of gross injustice on the part of Charles the Second to have overlooked the interests of Cromwell's soldiers and adventurers, as the complete reduction of the Irish rebels by Cromwell redounded essentially to the advantage of the British empire. The true constitutional Whig principles, upon which the Revolution in 1688 had been effected, gave to this party in Ireland a fresh opportunity of working up the old republican leaven, that had never quitted them under the plausisible appellation of Whigs. This actuated the commons to propose the several penal laws against the Catholics under Anne; this intimidated her Whig ministers into compliance even against the wisdom, policy, and wishes of the court. So popu lar a cry. was the reduction of Popery, that no ministry had hitherto ventured openly to oppose it, however cruel or illseasoned were the measures proposed for effectuating it. From this declaration of the lords it is to be collected, that the Whig majority in the commons were chiefly the relics of the old Protestant ascendency, which had imbibed and retained those principles of revolutionary republicanism, of which the lords ad

dress, echoing the voice of the British ministry, so loudly complained. It was no new or sudden grievance, but an old standing evil, which had been long sorely felt and timidly tolerated. And now that the primitive fervour and confidence of the new ministry had produced this open and unequivocal attack upon the Whig party, they dared not do it, without tempering their declaration. with professions of their own zeal against Popery, although no complaint or charge had been laid against the Catholics by their keenest enemy. Certain it is, that from the encouragement given to the Oliverian party in Ireland, and other obvious causes, the republican spirit of that day had taken such deep root in their descendants, that created the alarm and dread now first avowed in this address of the lords to the queen. extremes are vicious: the perfection of the British constitution All consists in the reciprocal checks upon the different powers from running into opposite extremes. the legitimate offspring of the British constitution; they prevent The true Whig principles are as effectually the pruriency of Democracy, as they defeat the despotism of absolute monarchy.*

The party in the House of Commons, which still maintained its majority against the Tory administration, was supported by all the influence of the Dissenters:† and it cannot be denied, that they pushed the Whig principles to an excess wholly irrecon

From the peculiar situation of Ireland, the attention of the Irish Protestants hitherto had been generally confined to the exclusive object of acquiring and preserving an ascendency over the Catholic interest. The Earl of Clarendon, who was himself a keen partisan, was the first who introduced any party distinction amongst the Protestants of Ireland. During his short gov. ernment of Ireland in 1685, he evinced his zeal for his master's service by endeavouring to split the Protestants into Whigs and Tories, in order to supply his own want of co-operation with the king's wishes to forward the cause of Popery, from which he was by principle most averse. his brother the Earl of Rochester, who was appointed lord lieutenant in the Both Clarendon, and year 1701, and several of the high church clergy, whom they had promoted in Ireland, were inflexible in their convictions, that the generality of those who called themselves Whigs in Ireland, were strongly impregnated with the factious spirit of 1649: and upon this principle they were anxious to subdivide the Protestants into parties, in order to discriminate their own party from the real enemies to the crown, who still retained so much of the leaven of the interregnum: for hitherto Protestant and Whig had continued to be considered as synonymous in Ireland. And no whig in that country had till that time signalized himself by the avowal of any constitutional principle whatever.

Far be it from me to insinuate that this deviation from the strict line of constitutional conduct was in any manner caused by religious doctrine or persuasion. In every Christian country, different denominations of Christians have at times swerved from, as well as observed, their civil duties. Presbyterians have evinced as firm loyalty to monarchs, as Catholics have to republics. Every society of Christians lay claim to the purest and closest adherence to Evangelical perfection; and they all hold the system of Christianity practicable under every lawful form of government. Bigotry, ignorance, or malice can alone consider the practice of any religious society incompatible with the British constitution.

cilable with the constitutional doctrines of civil liberty. The spirit of party became every day more violent: yet all the political differences, which then distracted the kingdom, existed between Protestant and Protestant. Whatever excesses either party gave into, were nevertheless either palliated or sanctioned by some fresh obloquy or severity thrown upon the Catholics. The Duke of Shrewsbury, though a Tory in principle, was induced through policy to espouse the cause of the Whigs, and as converts are generally prominently severe to the party they have abandoned, his Grace was no way suspected of favouring the Catholics, whose religion he had renounced. He was unusually splendid in celebrating the anniversary of King William, and vehement in promoting the Protestant succession. By a dissolution of parliament, the ministry hoped to gain a majority in the commons, as they had secured it in the lords: but on the return, the Whigs still retained a small majority. This they availed themselves of, by voting a most severe address* to the queen upon Sir Constantine Phipps, the chancellor, who had distinguished himself in the Tory party by his intimacy with the famous Dr. Sacheverell, whose trial had afforded a notable triumph to the Whigs in England. The queen's answer to another address of the commons, dated from Windsor on the 13th of December, 1713, shewed how little congenial with the dispositions of the court these efforts of the commons were.

2 Journ. Comm. p. 770.

The private demeanour and official conduct of Sir Constantine Phipps confirmed all the unfavourable prepossessions against him, which the Whigs in Ireland had conceived from his zeal and activity in defence of Dr. Sache. verell. He associated only with Tories and churchmen, and was entertained by the nobility and gentlemen of that description with the most magnificent hospitality he received the congratulations and thanks of the clergy as the patron of their order, and the champion of the rights of the church. Under the auspices of such a judge, every legal check upon the licentiousness of the party which he patronized was suspended. The most malignant attacks upon the Dissenters daily issued from the press, and even those publications, which had been condemned in England for their seditious tendency, were reprinted and dispersed without any reprehension from the Irish ministers. Mr. Higgins, a clergyman, who had been put out of the commission of the peace by the late Chancellor Coxe, on account of his indecent and turbulent beha. viour, was now restored to his seat by Sir Constantine Phipps. On the very day of resuming his authority, he gave such offence to his colleagues by his insolent and unguarded expressions, that he was presented by the grand jury of the county of Dublin, as a sower of sedition and groundless jealousies among her majesty's Protestant subjects; but he was acquitted by the lord lieutenant and privy council, to the great joy of the high church party. (Annals Anne, p. 192-3.)

Mr. Higgins had been a co-adjutor of Dr. Sacheverell in England; and rivalled him in the vehemence with which he declaimed upon the danger of the church, and the treachery of the ministers (Cunningham, vol. ii. p. 275.) He was the author of several severe tracts against the Dissenters, and was supposed to have drawn up a narrative concerning the conspiracy of the Protestants in Westmeath, which contained reflections injurious to all the Whig gentlemen in Ireland.

She told them, that the best way of preserving their religious and civil rights, and securing the Protestant succession, as well as the best proof they could give of their real concern for them, was to proceed with unanimity and temper in supplying the necessary occasions of the government, and in establishing peace at home, by discountenancing the restless endeavours of those factious spirits who attempted to sow jealousies, and raise groundless fears in the minds of her people.

These facts, which appear upon the face of the parliamentary records of Ireland, incontestibly prove, that none of the com plaints or charges of disaffection, sedition, turbulence, disloyalty, or civil and political licentiousness of any species during this queen's reign fell upon the great body of the Irish people, but arose from the conduct of that Protestant part of the nation, which retained the leaven of the interregnum, and which was too powerful and too determined to be awed or openly opposed by the British cabinet. Hence the disgraceful subterfuge, which Bishop Burnet assures us, the ministry was driven to, in order to cause the miscarriage of the Popery bill, by sharpening its severity against the promoters of it, fearing to offend that party by opposing the cruelties, which they were imposing on the Catholics, although conscious that the measure was neither wise, politic, nor just.

In so much diffidence and contempt did the British parliament hold that of Ireland during this queen's reign, that in every matter, which was considered to be of importance to the British empire, they expressly legislated for Ireland, as if Ireland had no parliament of her own. Thus did the British legislature direct the sale of the estates of Irish rebels, and disqualify Catholics from purchasing them; thus did it avoid leases made to Papists; thus augment small vicarages, and confirm grants made to the archbishop of Dublin: it permitted Ireland to export linen to the plantations; prohibited the importation of that commodity from Scotland; and appointed the town of New Ross, in the county of Wexford, as the port for exporting wool, from Ireland to England. In the Schism Act, which Sir William Wyndham brought into the House of Commons in England, in the year 1714, the interference of the British legislature with Ireland was the most remarkable. was aimed by the Tory party at the total suppression of the This bill, which Dissenters, was warmly opposed by the Whigs in both houses. Into that bill the following clause was introduced: that "where "law is the same, the remedy and means for enforcing the "execution of the law should be the same: be it therefore enacted, by the authority aforesaid, that all and every the

* 2 Journ. Comm. p. 771.

"remedies, provisions, and clauses, in and by this act given, "made, and enacted, shall extend, and be deemed, construed, "and adjudged to extend to Ireland, in as full and effectual "manner as if Ireland had been expressly named and men❝tioned in all and every the clauses of this act." Considering the intolerant quality of the Act, it was the policy of the Tory administration to introduce it with as few objectionable clauses as possible, expecting naturally a warm opposition to it. It was chiefly opposed on the third reading, in which opposition Sir Joseph Jekill was prominently forward; he insisted, that it tended to raise as great a persecution against their Protestant brethren, as the primitive Christians ever suffered from the Heathen emperors, particularly Julian the apostate.* It passed the commons by a majority of 237 voices against 126, without the clause affecting Ireland: this was proposed by the Earl of Anglesea, when the bill was in the committee of the lords, which, after some debate, was carried in the affirmative by the majority of one voice only. Several severe speeches were made in the House of Lords against the clause extending the bill to Ireland; particularly by the Duke of Shrewsbury, who had returned on the very day of the debate from Ireland. The clause was, however, carried by 57 votes against 51; and on the next day the bill was carried by a majority of 5 votes, viz. of 77 against 72. A very strong protest was entered by thirty-four of the leading Whig party, the last part of which relates to Ireland: "The miseries (said they) we apprehend here, are greatly “enhanced by extending this bill to Ireland, where the conse"quences of it may be fatal: for since the number of Papists in "that kingdom far exceeds the Protestants of all denominations 66 together, and that the Dissenters are to be treated as enemies,

* Chand. Deb. 5 vol. p. 135.

Deb. Lords, 2 vol. p. 428.

The minister commanded a much larger majority in the commons than in the lords. It was for this reason that the queen was advised to call twelve fords up to the House of Peers, who were in derision called by the opposite party the college of the twelve apostles. "It was upon these motives (said Swift, Hist. p. 44,) that the treasurer advised her majesty to create twelve "new lords, and thereby disable the sting of faction for the rest of her life "time: this promotion was so ordered, that a third part were of those on "whom, or their posterity, the peerage would naturally devolve; and the rest "were such whose merit, birth, and fortune could admit of no exception.".... In the reasons pro and con given by Swift, we clearly see the opposite spirits of the politicians of that day: the Whigs complained of the ill example set to wicked princes, who might as well create one hundred as twelve peers, which would ensure the command of the House of Lords, and thus endanger our liberties. The Tories insisted, that in our constitution the prince holding the balance of power between the nobility and people, ought to be able to remove from one scale into the other, so as to bring both to an equilibrium: and that the Whigs had been for above twenty years corrupting the nobility with republican principles, which nothing but the royal prerogative could hinder from overspreading us.

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