the heavy grievances, long and patiently endured by the Irish, appears from comparing the records of the times. The former revolted against a king, whose whole reign was a series of concessions and graces to them; whose administration was frugal and patriotic, as a prudent parent would administer for favored children. The latter were governed with a rod of iron, insecure in their persons and properties, persecuted for their religion, wounded in every feeling of the heart.

When the ill adviser, and tyrannic deputy, Strafford, was arraigned for high treason, and a committee of the Irish house of commons attended to prefer complaints of their grievances against him, the king seems to have become sensible of his mal-administration, and gave orders to the justices, Parsons and Borlace, to transmit bills for the purpose of securing the Irish in the possession of their estates. The lords justices, of the covenanting faction, creatures of the rebel parliament, were better inclined to obey the secret instructions of their patrons, than the orders of Charles; besides, an insurrection opened a prospect of gaining estates from confiscated lands. Private interest being thus combined with the views of the faction, led them to disobey the king's commands, and frustrate his conciliatory measures. "Had his majesty's commands, to pass the bills for securing the estates of the natives, and for confirming the other promised graces, been duly executed, or rather not positively disobeyed by their lordships, the dreadful

insurrection of the following year, either would not at all have happened, or would have been quickly suppressed. Such, at least, was his majesty's opinion; as we find by his answer to a declaration of the English commons on that occasion; for there he tells them, "that if he had been obeyed in the Irish affairs, before he went to Scotland, there had been no Irish rebellion; or after it had begun, it would have been in a few months suppressed, if his directions had been observed: for if the king had been suffered to perform his engagements to the Irish agents, and had disposed of the discontented Irish army beyond sea, there is nothing more clear, than that there could have been no rebellion in Ireland, because they had wanted both pretence and means to have made one,"

"At this time it was confidently reported in Ireland, that the Scottish army had threatened never to lay down their arms, till an uniformity of religion was established in the three kingdoms, and the catholic religion suppressed. "A letter," says Mr. Carte, "was intercepted coming from Scotland, to one Freeman, of Antrim, giving an account, that a covenanting army was ready to come for Ireland, under the command of general Leslie, to extirpate the Roman catholics of Ulster, and leave the Scots sole possessors of that province; and to this end, a resolution had been taken in their private meetings, and councils, to lay heavy fines upon such as would not appear at their kirk, for the first or second Sunday; and on failure the third, to hang, without mercy,

all such as were obstinate, at their own doors."

"The whole body of the catholic nobility and gentry of Ireland declared in their remonstrance at Trim, which was delivered in due form to his majesty's commissioners, in March 1642, that previous to the insurrection, "certain dangerous and pernicious petitions, contrived by the advice and counsel of sir William Parsons, sir Adam Loftus, sir John Clothworthy, and sundry others of the malignant party in the city of Dublin, in the province of Ulster, and several other parts of the kingdom, directed to the commons house in England, were at public assizes and other public places made known and read to many persons of quality; which petitions contained matters destructive to the said catholic religion, lives and estates."*

This dread of an extirpation, as appears from a multitude of depositions taken before Dr. Henry Jones, and other commissioners appointed by the lords justices, prevailed universally among the catholics of Ireland, and was insisted upon, as one of the principal reasons for their taking arms,

"Some time before the rebellion broke out, says Mr. Carte, it was confidently reported, that Sir John Clothworthy, who well knew the designs of the faction that governed the house of commons in England, had declared there in a speech, that the conversion of the papists in Ireland, was only to be effected by the bible in one hand and the sword in the other; and Mr. Pym gave out, that they would not leave a priest in Ireland. To the like effect sir William Parsons, out of a strange weakness, or detestable policy, positively asserted before many witnesses, at a public entertainment, that within a twelvemonth, no catholic should VOL. II. 3 Q

The earl of Ormond, in his letters of January 27th, and February 26th, 1641, to William St. Leger, imputes the general revolt of the nation, then far advanced, to the publishing of such a design."*

Considering all the wrongs and oppressions, heaped on the Irish nation during two successive reigns, their attachment to the Stuart family would appear at first sight unaccountable; yet, on some consideration, the causes thereof will appear. The far greater part of the landed property of Ireland was by this time vested in English colonists, settled thereon at different periods. All these, entertaining jealousies of the antient proprietors, held the connexion with England as necessary to their secure possession of what had been ravished from the Milesians. Even those who adhered to the catholic faith, chose rather to endure the penalties and disqualifications, inflicted by a protestant government, than risk the revival of old claims by a separation. In a situation, presenting according to their judgments but a choice, they naturally adopted be seen in Ireland; he had sense enough to know the conse quences that would naturally arise from such a declaration; which, however it might contribute to his own selfish views, he would have hardly have ventured to make so openly, and without disguise, if it had not been agreeable to the politics and measures of the English faction, whose party he espoused, and whose directions were the general rule of his conduct."

"It is evident," says Dr. Warner, "from the lord justice's letter to the earl of Leicester, then lord lieutenant, that they hoped for an extirpation, not of the meer Irish only, but of all the old English families also, that were Roman catholics." * Curry. Civil Wars, Ire.

what appeared to them the least. In the conflict between the king and his rebellious subjects, both catholics and church-established protestants espoused the royal cause, from motives equally strong. Tis true, the former suffered penalties and pains under the monarchy, but then its enemies proclaimed the utter suppression of popery, and the extermination of papists, of whatsoever nation, rank or condition, without respect of persons; as may be seen in that canting, fanatical, intolerant libel on religion and common sense, called the solemn league and covenant, subscribed by James VI. of Scotland, his parliament &c. an. 1580, subscribed again, an. 1584, an. 1590, an. 1638, an. 1639; the next year, 1640, the blessed fruits of the covenant appeared in a horrid rebellion, raised by the covenanters against their

"The National Covenant, or the Confession of Faith, We all, and every one of us under written protest, that after long and due examination of our consciences in matters of true and false religion, we are now throughly resolved of the truth, by the word and spirit of God: and therefore we be lieve with our hearts, confess with our mouths, subscribe with our hands, and constantly affirm before God and the whole world, that this is the only true christian faith and religion pleasing God, and bringing salvation to man, which now is by the mercy of God revealed to the world, by the preaching of the blessed Evangel, and received, believed, and defended by many and sundry notable kirks and realms, but chiefly by the kirk of Scotland, and the king's majesty, and three estates of this realm, as God's eternal truth, and only ground of our salvation, as more particularly is expressed in the confession of our faith, established, and publicly confirmed by sundry acts of parliaments, and now of a long time hath been openly professed by the king's majesty, and whole body of this realm, both in burgh, and land. To, the which