asks "what security can you give if we adopt this measure?" I reply, every security that we possess, if we do not adopt it, and a great deal more. I say that concession cannot augment the danger-nay, I will go further and assert that it is most eminently calculated to diminish it. Now, what is the danger as represented by the right honourable gentleman? and I am aware that I am taking a license in referring back to what fell from him on the last occasion; and mark here that I state no danger; I give merely what was suggested by the right honourable gentleman: it is this-that there is a large majority of the people of Ireland of a religion different from that of the establishment. My own opinion is that that majority is larger than is usually supposed, but it is sufficient for me that there is such a disproportion as to produce danger. Further, the right honourable gentleman says that that majority in Ireland principally contributes to the support of the clergy of the establishment and entirely support their own church; that for spiritual purposes they are necessarily under the control of a foreign power uncontrolled by the state; and that their own clergy possesses an extensive influence over their feelings, prejudices, and passions, and that that clergy is appointed by its head, without the interference of the sovereign of this country. In addition, it is argued that this majority has been ejected by those who are now in possession of the establishment, and not ejected, as in England at the reformation, by the force of public opinion, but by the strong arm of power, thereby unavoida

bly leaving behind discontent and irritation. Since the right honourable gentleman made that statement a new circumstance occurred

viz. that some of these persons have now the command of our fleets and armies-that is, they are admitted to the possession of substantial power in the state: they are gradually advancing in numbers and wealth, and they are admitted to these important privileges by virtue of oaths. If then (the right honourable gentleman contended) the Roman catholics are true to the principles of their nature-to their passions, sentiments, and impulses-if they are like ourselves, and governed by the same motives, they cannot be faithful to their oaths. According to his notion, then, these persons are admitted into the heart of the state, upon oaths by which they will not be bound, so that they enter tainted with the odious crimes of hypocrisy and perjury. In addition to all this, they are excluded from the remaining privileges of the state by oaths, and by oaths only. This forcibly ejected majority is not less than four or five to one; and I ask the right honourable gentleman-I ask any man interested in the welfare of the establishment, whether this is a condition in which matters should be left? Is this the bed of roses— the heap of Elysian flowers on which he is disposed to take his repose? Indeed the manner in which he argued the question is most dangerous: he says, that if the catholics are true to the religion they profess, true to their prejudices and passions, they must aim at the subversion of the establishment. If then they are

bound

bound to aim at its subversion, I hope we are equally strongly bound to aim at its support: all are bound to do so, as we regard our property, our lives, our liberty, and as we regard the connexion between the two countries. On the other hand, they are urged forward to its destruction, hot only by every feeling of their nature, but by the awful sanction of religious obligation. Thus catholics and protestants are in a state of interminable hostility; we are bound to support our establishment to our last gasp, and they to their latest breath bound to attempt its destruction. Thus are we lashed together, for ever struggling, and never in security. Yet cried the enemies of concession, "Would you come forward to disturb this state of blessed tranquillity? Let us remain in our delightful condition of ease and safety!" Let me ask whether they have a right to leave the country in this condition? If I could view the question as the right honourable member for Ox. ford looks at it, I would at once abandon all intention of legislation; not in the hope that I should bring back the freedom, the glory, and the security of our ancestors, but because I should think they were doomed to perish. I should retire from the question, not like him to a state of rest, but of torpor-not to repose, but to that insensibility which is the prelude to dissolution. I do not believe that the right honourable gentleman sees all the consequences to which his argument leads: in his view toleration would be an act of suicide, not of liberality; and if, as he maintains, it be a necessary rinciple of their reli

gion to pull down our establish ment, we must on our part strive to pull down their faith; if this serpent of division be engendered under their altars, we must overturn those altars: if this spark of animosity be cherished and fed by their religion, we must extinguish that religion. This duty-this principle of intolerance which we impute to them, recoils with fearful increase upon ourselves, it resolves itself into the pure, unmixed, sublimated spirit of religious bigotry, and nothing else. It is really a great consolation to me, that in resisting this argument I at the same time vindicate the Roman catholics from a frightful imputation cast upon them and upon the protestants. On the part of the Roman catholics, I will be bold to say that they harbour no principle of hostility to our establishment. The precedent of the Scotish union, formerly referred to by the right honourable gentleman, has really no application to the case: the presbyterian religion was established at the reformation; it was incorporated in the act of union, and makes part of the fundamental law of the land. The reverse is the fact with the catholic faith; and every rational Roman catholic feels himself no more at liberty to attempt the subversion of our establishment than to entertain the unworthy purpose of depriving an individual of his property. He knows that the same principle gives him and us life, liberty, and property; and he wisely prefers the protestant establishment in an unimpaired state to a Roman catholic establishment in a subverted one. He is bound by the

oath

oath he takes, both as a man and a christian, not only not to make the attempt, but to resist it, if made in any other quarter; and if indeed the oath were, as is contended, so contrary to the principles of his religion and his nature, it would be as unjustifiable in the legislature to impose it as it would be disgraceful in a catholic to take it. I ask the right honourable gentleman on what authority he takes upon him, in opposition to the assertions, to the oaths of the catholics, to brand and burn this stigma upon their foreheads? What have they said or done since the period of the revolution to show that they mean to touch the establishment? This is answered by the assertions that it is no matter what they swear; let them swear what they will the catholics must break their oaths, and our establishment must be endangered. The right honourable gentleman maintained that he was authorised by his views to exclude them from this state on principles that would make them unworthy of any state. I cannot find in the large volume of human nature any principle which calls upon Roman catholics to subvert that state by whose laws he is protected, merely that the heads of his priests may be decorated with a mitre; and the right honourable gentleman must excuse me if I say that he equally mistakes the institutions of man and the principles of human action. The alliance between church and state depends upon principles of the highest kind, and its consequences are beneficial to any man who professes any religion. The catholic does not indulge the chi

If

merical notion of heaving the British constitution from its basis that his priest may wear lawn sleeves and a mitre. If, however, he is excluded from the privileges of the state merely on account of his religion;--if he is made an invidious exception in a country which permits the talents and virtues of all other men to advance them to the highest honours; and if this exception extend to the filii natorum et qui nascentur ab illis, they will indeed have a sufficient motive to aim at the destruction of that state which heaps upon them only so heavy a load of injustice. What then is the difference between us? the house consented to the com→ mittee, one suggestion he should make would be, that the intercourse between the Roman catholics of these realms and the see of Rome should be under the inspection of the state, and that it should be applied to spiritual purposes only. What is the remedy of the right honourable gentleman? To leave that intercourse as it is, uninspected. I propose in the next place that, in the appointment of bishops and clergy, effectual means should be given to the crown of being assured of the loyalty of the person selected. What is the remedy of the right honourable gentleman? To leave it exactly as it is. He is strangely satisfied with the existence of these evils; he seems in love with the perfection of his danger, and to his utmost resists every attempt at mutilation. But my third and last remedy, in comparison with which the rest are trifling, vain, and nugatory, is to incorporate the Roman catholics with the state, that their

interest

reasonable that he should be admitted to the constituency, by being qualified to vote for a member of parliament, and yet be declared ineligible as a candidate? If the intention of the catholic was to subvert the church and constitution, why was he permitted to vote for members of parliament? If his intention was not to subvert either, why was he not competent to be elected? This view of the subject would show that it was neither politic, rational, nor wise to leave the catholic in the situation in which he was placed by the act of 1793, and that the right honourable gentleman had no good ground for wishing to continue him in that situation. There was still one point which he (Mr. Plunkett) could not pass over-it was one that, besides its importance in relation to the empire at large, had a personal claim on himself-he alluded to the situation of the catholic at the bar he was admitted as a member of that profession, but its power and honours were refused him; he was invited to display his talents and information in a public theatre, and every person bound to him by religion and affinity was gladdened at his progress; but, after advancing into honourable character in his profession; when his heart beat high with hope, and the prospect of success ought to have opened on his talents, and attainments, he was obliged to stay short; his hopes were dashed to the ground; his manly and useful ambition was checked; he saw many of his friends who had started with him in the race, pass by him on the way, and he was left in a state of gloomy hopeless 1821.

He

despondency at the outer door of the temple, not allowed to step over the threshold to acquire any of those honours which invited his more fortunate competitors, and thus his fate finally disheartened every person connected with him by affinity and religion, who had been delighted by the promise of his outset. Was it right to hold out hopes in this manner, only to produce a more cruel disappointment? Was it wise to turn the honest and useful ambition of the catholic into disgust and fruitless despair? Was it politic thus to sow the seeds of discontent, and disseminate them so lavishly throughout the country? He knew many catholics in the profession, and he knew them to be as loyal and as much attached as any men could be to every part of the constitution. knew them to be actuated only by such motives as honest and well-affected subjects could avow, and he felt the disgrace which was inflicted on the bar by their exclusion from its honours. the protestant part of that bar, and on its behalf, he besought the house to rescue them from the stigma of this odious monopoly, and to give to talents and honourable exertions their fair reward. But it was asked where concessions should stop? He answered, concessions should stop when there was a necessity that exclusion should still exist; but that necessity should be clearly made out, and the difficulty which attended it would be more than compensated by the result; for wherever the necessity was clearly shown to exist, there the exclusion conveyed no insult. If the catholic saw the reason, he was

F

For

bound