impossible they should; but it is not more inconsistent with right principles» of government, than that the subjects of a Protestant government should acknowledge a foreign Popish authority, independent of their own national government. The advocates of the Popish claims maintain that they must be conceded; for that the Irish discontents cannot be quieted without them; and that the concessions are necessary to the safety and prosperity of the British empire. But in their zeal for the Papists they overlook the Protestant discontents, which must inevitably follow from the grant of the Popish claims. They forget, or they wish us to forget, that the Roman Catholics of Ireland are only a part, about a fifth part, of the whole British community; that the great majority of the empire are Protestants, whose interests are to be consulted in preference to any subordinate part; and that for the sake of this great majority we have a Protestant government, and Protestant laws, and a Protestant king, who is sworn to maintain inviolate the established Protestant constitution. If there is any danger of a Popish rebellion, which I do not believe, from not granting these claims, there is, surely, much more reason to fear a Protestant rebellion from granting them,-in defence of a religion endeared to Britain by its high Apostolical antiquity, and an inheritance of almost eighteen centuries, in comparison with which the Popery of Britain, established for a few centuries after the Norman conquest, was a modern usurpation. Yet Popish writers say, that "the Protestants have dispossessed the Roman Catholics of their inheritance, and fatten in their seats." This can be said, and admitted, only in utter ignorance of the history of the British Church: The British Church was never their's but by usurpation. For though our Saxon ancestors were converted to Christianity by Popish missionaries, yet, at that very period, the British Church, maintaining herself in the unconquered parts of the Island, had subsisted from the days of her first founder, St. Paul, and distinguished herself not only by her opposition to the heresy of Pelagius, but to the corruptions of Popery. We could Here we take our leave of this well-timed tract. with much pleasure give many extracts from it; but we refer our Readers to the publication itself, which is comprized in sixty-nine pages.-As to any difference of opinion subsisting between the Bishop of St. David's and the very learned Dr. Hales, as truth is the object of their investigation, we are perfectly satisfied that no harm whatever, but rather much good, will result from pursuing it. Two such minds cannot but discover it; and two such minds cannot but embrace it, when ascertained, with supreme satisfaction. Substance of the Speech, delivered in the House of Commons, by the Right Honorable George Canning, on Monday, June 22, 1812; on bringing forward his Motion, for the Consideration of the Laws affecting His Majesty's Roman Catholic Subjects.Hatchard. as a statesman. 1812. We have been taught to look upon Mr. Canning as a man endowed with talents of the first order; and yet we must honestly. confess, that he has often disappointed our expectations. He gave early promise of great abilities; but perhaps the Senate is not exactly the place best calculated to call them forth. He was an extraordinary school-boy, but he does not shine so brilliantly Eton was a soil in which he flourished, and blossomed ; - transplanted to Whitehall, he suffered a blight. At Oxford or Cambridge he might do better things than any that he has hitherto achieved in Westminster. He may not, perhaps, be equal to the duties of the Dean of Christ-Church, but he would make an excellent Master of Downing-College. He some. what resembles Mr. Addison, who was an elegant scholar, but a poor Secretary of State. Addison, however, was no speaker; his diffidence, and the weakness of his nerves, would not permit him to distinguish himself as an orator. Perhaps Mr. Canning, who speaks with ease, has spoken too frequently; at least, we think that he had better have been silent than have delivered the speech, of which the Substance is now before us. It will not increase his fame as a debater ;-it is a poor effort, taken as an essay;-it is poverty itself, regarded as the speech of an accomplished parliamentary orator. To what can this be owing? -Did he not understand his subject? or, was the subject given him as a task? were his understanding and his tongue at variance? is it an effect of party, to paralyze intellect; to smother invention; to confuse the "mind's eye;" to magnify trifles, and to render it blind to things of the greatest moment? If so, then we may exclaim-unhappy Canning! What induced theė to connect thyself with the brother-in-law of Earl Nugent's daughter? That was an ill-omened hour which first saw Mr. Canning under-secretary to Lord Grenville. That connexion it was, which destroyed the fair hopes formed of him in early life -when contending statesmen were anxious to avail themselves of his assistance. He has lost all originality of sentiment. His political principles have been dealt out to him in daily orders." When under-secretary, a scrap of paper in the green-box lettered F. D. directed all his motions.-Shall a man of genius thus be drilled into a drudge? shall his mighty mind conform itself to the model, or shrivel up to the contracted size of that possessed by his master? must he damp the scintillations of fancy, lest he awaken jealousy? shall he check the tide of eloquence, for fear of being thought to vie with his principal? shall he estimate right and wrong by a rule prescribed to him, and not by the judgment of his own discriminating faculty? shall he crouch to dictation?-Wretched slavery! how contemptible is he who submits to it! how fit an object of scorn and derision! "Who but must laugh, if such a man there be? Who but must weep, if Atticus were he?' Is it possible that Mr. Canning could have made so miserable a speech as that attributed to him in the pamphlet under consideration? We sincerely hope that it is only the imperfect echo of some stupid reporter, and not a sketch made by the hand of the orator himself:-for we cannot think that Mr. Canning would have recourse to that artifice (alluded to by Mr. Sheridan, in his classification of puffs) which has a wonderful memory for parliamentary debates, and will often give the whole speech of a favoured member, with the most flattering accuracy." Most certainly the pamphlet now on our table is an anti-puff. It is distinguished by no brilliancy of wit; it is not remarkable for profundity of argument; it has all the, flatness of the Grenvilleschool,-it is dull as lead, and ponderous as platina. It opens with a schoolboyish anaphora, the burden of which is the word "when." Mr. Speaker,-When you consider the extent and magnitude of the subject which I have undertaken this day to press upon the attention of the House, with the hope, that through their decision I may succeed in recommending it to the serious attention of the Executive Government; when you recollect the various discussions which this subject has undergone, as well within these walls as in other places ;—when you reflect on the anxiety which it keeps alive in one part of the United Kingdom, an anxiety of which I am sorry to say, we have in the course of this very * Foreign Department. day received some strong and painful indications; *-you may perhaps be led to apprehend that I shall find myself obliged to trespass on your patience for a considerable length of time. In this apprehension, however, I hope the House will be disappointed: for, however wide the compass, and however complicated the details of this great question may be, yet the statement which I think it necessary to make of it, for the purpose of my present Motion, rests on a few plain and simple principles. This is the style of Sir Christopher Hatton, addressing Sir Walter Raleigh "Alas! my noble friend, when I behold Yon tented plains in martial symmetry Arrayed ;-when I count o'er yon glitt'ring lines Surmise, the State some danger apprehends." Unfortunately for Mr. Canning, news had arrived in London, on the very morning of the day on which this notable speech was delivered, that most intemperate proceedings had taken place at a Meeting of the Romanists in Dublin; that they had disavowed, and disclaimed, by anticipation, all that he might choose to stipulate in pleading their cause; that they would not pledge themselves to abide by any promise which he might eventually be induced to make in their name; that they would enter into no conditions with Parliament; and that they would accept of nothing short of an absolute concession of every claim, and the complete annulling of every restriction. This unexpected violence of the sweet-blooded Papists, distressed their ingenious • The Resolutions passed at the Aggregate Meeting of the Roman Catholicks, in Dublin, on Thursday June the 18th, which were received in London on the morning of Mr. Canning's Motion. advocate beyond measure. If he had not undergone the drilling mentioned above, if he had not been used to breakfast upon a toad, occasionally, the independent soul of Mr. Canning might have induced him indignantly to throw up his brief. Unquestionably, the vote of the Aggregate Meeting was ill-timed and ill-judged; and it was lucky for the Romanists that Mr. Canning's feelings were under such subjection to his sense of duty, that he ascribed the rude asperity of his clients, merely to the "habitual irritation of the public mind in Ireland," of which he regarded the slap on the face that he had received, as "only one symptom." He resolves to abstain from all "inflammatory language," and to view the discussion in the House of Commons, a great state question," not as "a struggle of conflicting as 66 parties." Mr. Canning not only thus masters his own feelings, but he says (if the reporter of his speech has given its substance correctly), that he would "most gladly persuade the House, if possible," to manifest equal calmness; and "to lay out of its recollection all former debates and differences on the subject." This is a tolerably modest attempt at persuasion,-that the House should lose all memory of past transactions; that it should forget the repeal of penal statutes; the yielding of the elective franchise, and all the other boons; together with all sense of the effect of such liberal conduct on the minds of those addicted to the Popish superstition;-not the exciting of gratitude, but the causing of murmurs; not quiet, but disturbance; not peace, but rebellion. No, Mr. Canning, the House was not then for the first time debating a relaxation of those laws, which were framed to curb the dangerous spirit of Popery, and to prevent, if pos sible, a repetition of those tragedies, which the Papists had acted both in Ireland and England. Parliament had unwarily, and therefore unwisely, been employed for some years in undoing what sad necessity and dearly-bought experience, had formerly compelled the Legislature to do.. No good effects had arisen from re-admitting to the exercise of civil rights, those who formerly had so grossly abused them. Indulgence rendered them impatient, and a prospect of gaining their ends, maddened them to a degree of insolence altogether unbecoming those who pretended |