ADVERTISEMENT.

The Reader's attention is particularly called to the subjoined DOCUMENTS, of indubitable Authority:

No. 1.-Shews that Members of Parliament were not obiged to take the Oath of Supremacy before the time of King William III. DOCUMENTS, page 1.

2 and 3.-Shew the only Oath that was necessary to be taken by certain descriptions.of Persons in Ireland to enable them to enjoy Rights, &c. p. p. 3 and 4.

4, 5, and 6.-Shew that Charles T. and Charles II. entered into the most Solemn Treaties with the Irish Roman Catholics to secure, to them the Right of Sitting and Voting in Parliament, &c. p. p. 5, 13, and 30.

7. Shews the first attempt ever made to exclude the Roman Catholic Members from House of Commons, by the Puritan Party in that House, in 1642, page 31...

8.-Shews King Charles II.'s recognition of the validity of the Treaties of 1646 and 1648, made between the Duke of Ormond and the Irish Catholics, page 53.

9. Shews' the Peers who voted for the Act of Settlement, p. 56. 10, 11 and 12-Shew that Catholic Peers constantly sat in the

Irish House of Lords in the Parliaments of Charles II.; the distinction made in the Rules of the House, respecting hours of attendance of Protestant and Catholic Peers, p. p. 57, 60 and 61.

13. Shews the Right, and the exercise of the Right, of Roman Catholics to Sit in the House of Commons in the Reign of Charles II. page 61.

14 and 15.-Shew the Right of Catholics to sit in Parliament, and to their Freedom and Votes in Corporations at the latter end of the Reign of Charles II. p. p, 64 and 66.

16.-The Treaty of Limerick, page 68.

17. Shows the Proceedings in the Parliament in 1695, to exclude Catholics from their Seats in Parliament, page 79.

18. Shews the proceedings in the Parliament in 1697, on passing the Bill for the Confirmation of the Articles of Limerick, with the Protest of fourteen Protestant Peers against the injustice of Parliament in violating those Articles, which they did by that Bill, page 82.

ERRATA.

'In DOCUMENTS, Page 59, before the name of the Earl of Anglesea, dele *.

In heading of DOCUMENT, No. 14, Page 64, for(This and another Paper, concerning the Nominees, were sent April 10th, 1675, by the Lord Conway to the Lord Ranelagh, one of King Charles the Second's Ministers in England, by His Excellency Arthur Capel Earl of Essex, Lord Lieutenant of Ireland.)-read, (This and another Paper, concerning the Nominees, were sent by the Lord Conway to the Earl of Arlington.) In same heading, for Page 158, read Page 185.

PREFACE.

THE privation of Civil Rights under which the Roman Catholic subjects of these Kingdoms have unjustly suffered for a number of generations, and under which they still labour, has, for a long series of years, kept this nation in a state of agitation and discontent. For a redress of their grievances they have, almost year after year, for upwards of thirty years, in the most humble manner supplicated the Legislature. But their efforts have been unavailing. Bigotry and intolerance have triumphed over justice and humanity, and the Roman Catholics have still the mortification to feel themselves a degraded people in the land of their nativity, beside the loss of benefits which by the law of God and nature they have a right to enjoy, in common with the most favoured of their fellow-subjects. For a restoration of those rights the Catholics claim the benefit of treaties, solemnly entered into with them, and which secure to them the possession of those rights. Of these treaties that of Limerick, as being the last, and the fulfilment thereof being secured to them by the royal word of King William the Third, the Catholics claim the full benefit. The justice of their claims in this respect their enemies have been obliged to allow; and a violent opposer of those claims, a gentleman bigh in office, has declared, that if it can be proved that the Catholics of Ireland have been deprived of any rights secured to them by that treaty, he will himself vote for Catholic Emancipation. To satisfy the mind of that gentleman, and of all others who may be desirous to know how far the claims of the Catholics are countenanced by the

a

treaty in question, the following Documents, collected from Records, State Papers and Letters, and other authentic sources are now submitted.

That the Roman Catholics of Ireland in general never were, by any law, deprived of those rights which they now seek to recover, until the reign of King William the Third, it is submitted, the History and the Statute Law of the nation abundantly testify. Persons holding particular offices under the Crown were, indeed, by the Statute, Second of Elizabeth, chap. I. compelled to take the Oath of Supremacy, but no other description of persons were by that Statute prevented from the enjoyment of any Rights or Privileges they enjoyed at any previous period.-(See DOCUMENTS subjoined, No. 1, page 1.)

Mr. Carte in speaking of the Oath of Supremacy says, The Oath contains only a Declaration that the Queen (or King) is the only supreme Governor of this Realm, as well in Spiritual or Ecclesiastical things or causes as Temporal; and that no Foreign Prince, Prelate, State or Potentale, hath or ought to have, any jurisdiction, power, superiority, preeminence or authority Ecclesiastical or Spiritual within this Realm; with a promise of renouncing such foreign authority, and of maintaining that of the Crown of England. To guard against any wrong construction or perverse interpretation of this Ŏath, she at the same time published injunctions, wherein she declared that she pretended to no priestly power, and that she challenged no authorily, but what was of ancient time due to the Imperial Crown of England, that is, under God to have the sovereignty and rule over all manner of persons born within her dominions, of what estate, whether ecclesiastical or temporal soever they be, so as no other sovereign power shall or ought to have any superiority over them: and she allowed every body to accept the Oath with this interpretation and meaning." (Carte's Life of the Duke of Ormond, folio, London, p. 38.)

It is a well known historical fact, that all through the reign of Elizabeth the Roman Catholic Peers sat and voted, in the House of Lords, and the Knights, Citizens and Burgesses, sitting in the House of Commons, during the same period, were indiscriminately chosen from the Catholic and Protestant Bodies, and by Catholic and Protestant Electors. Indeed so well were the Protestant l'arty convinced that the Roman Catholics would have a majority in the House of Commons for the rejection of the Act for establishing the Queen's Supremacy, and that for the " Uniformity of Common Prayer and Service in the Church and the Administration of the Sacraments," (Second Eliz. cap. 2,) if the House were regularly constituted, and the full number of representatives returned to sit in Parliament, that they were obliged to have recourse to a stratagem to prevent the defeat of the Bill. This Parliament was convened by Thomas, Earl of Sussex, Lord Deputy of Ireland, who came over with special instructions for establishing the reformed worship. To enable him to act up to his instructions, in this particular, he took special care that out of the twenty Counties, into which Ireland was then divided, ten Counties only were summoned to return representatives to the House of Commons. The Counties summoned were Meath, Westmeath, Louth, Kildare, Catherlow, Kilkenny, Waterford, Tipperary and Wexford, The Counties not represented were Cork, Kerry, Limerick, Connaught, Clare, Antrim, Ardee Down, King's County and Queen's County. The other members of the House of Commons were Citizens and Burgesses of those Cities and Towns in which the Royal Authority was predominant, by which a majority for the Queen's wishes was secured. The entire number of the Commons amounted to only seventy-six. The number of Peers who sat in the House of Lords was only forty-three, of which twenty were Bishops, and of these only two, Welsh of Meath, and Leve