protestant neighbours, as made the generality of them believe that the words popery, rebellion and massacre, really signified the same thing, and thereby excited such real terrors in these latter, as often brought the liberties and sometimes the lives of the former into imminent danger. The most shocking circumstances of, the Irish insurrection in 1641, and of the English gunpowder treason in 1605, were studiously revived and aggravated in these sermons and pamphlets, with a degree of virulence and exaggeration, which, as it surpassed the most extravagant fictions of romance or poetry, so it possessed their uninformed, though often well-meaning, hearers and readers with lasting and general abhorrence of these people. The crimes, real or supposed, of catholics dead more than a century before, were imputed, intentionally, to all those who survived them, however innocent, of the same religious persua sion. By these means, an antient nobleman and privy-counsellor, of great power and influence, was so enthusiastically incensed against them, that, in the year 1743, on the threatened invasion of England by the French, under the command of marshal Saxe, he openly declared in council, "that as the papists had began the massacre on them, about an hundred years before, so he thought it both reasonable and lawful, on their parts, to prevent them, at that dangerous juncture, by first falling upon them." And although the barbarity of that suggestion was quickly over-ruled in that honorable assembly; yet so entirely were some of the lower northern dissenters possessed and influenced, by this prevailing prepossession and rancor against catholics, that in the same year, and for the same declared purpose of prevention, a conspiracy was actually formed by some of the inhabitants of Lurgan, to rise in the night-time and destroy all their neighbours of that denomination in their beds.* But this inhuman purpose was also frustrated, by an information of the honest protestant publican, in whose house the conspirators had met to settle the execution of their scheme, sworn before the Rev. Mr. Ford, a justice of the peace in that district, who received it with horror, and with difficulty put a stop to the intended massacre.

This atrocious design was known and attested by several of the inha, bitants of Lurgan; and an account of it was transmitted to Dublin by a considerable linen-merchant, then at Lurgan on his private mercantile affairs,

CHAP. XI.

The conduct of the catholics of Ireland in the time of the rebellion in Scotland, 1745.

ON account of the Scottish rebellion in 1745 in favor of the pretender, in which it will presently appear that not a single Irish catholic, lay or clerical, was any way engaged, the minds of the protestants all over the kingdom were so much irritated by the inflammatory means before-mentioned, together with the additional incentives of pastoral letters, of the like evil tendency, from all the bishops of the kingdom to their respective diocesans, that dreadful consequences, with regard to these inoffensive people, were justly apprehended; and probably would have ensued, had not the great wisdom and lenity of their then chief governor,* frequently and earnestly interposed. That nobleman, though pressed from all quarters by their powerful enemies, on a pretended knowledge of their disaffection, but really from the malignity of prejudice, to put the laws in force against them, always eluded their importunities, either by his own uncommon sagacity and resolution, or by some happy turn of pleasantry, which never failed to expose the folly of their apprehensions; for he quickly discovered, that they had neither the power nor the inclination to give the government any disturbance. And he even assured both houses of parliament," that France, which alone encouraged and supported the rash adventurer, had made use of him only as the occasional tool of their politics, and not as the real object of their care. That although Great Britain had, in the course of this century, been often molested by insurrections at home and invasions from abroad, Ireland had happily and deservedly enjoyed uninterrupted tranquillity." And in short, that this attempt to shake his majesty's throne, would serve to establish it the more firmly, since all Europe must know the unanimous zeal and affection of his subjects, for the defence of his person and government."

The great goodness and mercy of providence in sending such a governor among us, at that period of suspicion and danger,

* Earl of Chesterfield.

will be for ever most gratefully remembered by these people. Even their enemies in parliament, at the close of his administration, seem to have, in some measure, retracted their former councils of rigor and severity; for the commons in their address at the end of the session, after mentioning their late unquiet apprehensions, " acknowledged, with chearfulness and the utmost gratitude, that the profound tranquillity which, without any extraordinary increase of public expense, the nation had hitherto enjoyed, was the result of his excellency's wise and vigilant administration; formed upon the principles, and carried on by the uniform exercise of lenity without remissness, and of firmness without severity.”

I promised to make it appear, that no Irish catholic, lay or clerical, was any way engaged in the Scottish rebellion of 1745. I shall now endeavor to make good that promise. In the year 1762, upon a debate in the house of lords about the expediency of raising five regiments of these catholics, for the service of the king of Portugal, Doctor Stone (then Primate), in answer to some common-place objections against the good faith and loyalty of these people, which were revived with virulence on that occasion, declared publicly in the house of lords, that

in the year 1747, after that rebellion was entirely suppressed, happening to be in England, he had an opportunity of perusing all the papers of the rebels, and their correspondents, which were seized in the custody of Murray, the pretender's secretary; and that, after having spent much time and taken great pains in examining them (not without some share of the then common suspicion, that there might be some private understanding and intercourse between them and the Irish catholics), he could not discover the least trace, hint, or intimation of such intercourse or correspondence in them; or of any of the latter's favouring, abetting, or having been so much as made acquainted with the designs or proceedings of these rebels.And what," he said, " he wondered at most of all was, that in all his researches, he had not met with any passage in any of these papers, from which he could infer, that either their Holy Father the Pope, or any of his cardinals, bishops, or other dignitaries of that church; or any of the Irish clergy, had either directly or indirectly, encouraged, aided, or approved of, the commencing or carrying on of that rebellion."

CHAP. XII.

A bill for naturalizing the Jews passes the commons.

ON account of the continued severity of the popery laws (such of them particularly as executed themselves, as all those relating to property do), great numbers of the inoffensive natives had quitted Ireland, and carried their wealth and industry with them. And such was the mistaken policy of those days, that the protestant interest of Ireland was not believed to have suffered by this ruinous, though natural effect of these laws; on the contrary, it was confidently said to be strengthened and increased, by the removal of so many of its intestine enemies out of the kingdom! But as the strength and prosperity of a country are known and acknowledged to depend on the number and industry of its inhabitants, an expedient was soon looked for, and found, by the great wisdom of the nation, to supply the place of these self-exiled papists, by introducing foreign Jews, and providing a national settlement for those devoted vagrants. And although this expedient was, for a while, excepted against by some few over-scrupulous persons, as discovering an inordinate and precipitate zeal in its authors for strengthening the protestant interest, by a measure which seemed to bid defiance to a divine prophecy, and to sap the foundation of christianity itself; yet the Irish commons, in the session of 1747, brought heads of a bill into their house, “for naturalizing persons professing the Jewish religion; which were committed, agreed to by the house, without any amendment, and presented to his grace the lord lieutenant, to be by him transmitted into England." It is remarkable, that in the session immediately preceding, the same bill was brought into the commons, and "carried through, without any debate;" but it then miscarried either here or in England; as it also did this second time; so that it has not as yet had the honor of being .passed into a law among us. How aptly might each of these determined promoters of this hopeful bill, for strengthening the protestant interest of Ireland, have exclaimed in the word? of the poet,

Flectere si nequeo superos, Acheronta moveba !

CHAP. XIII.

The catholics address the lord lieutenant.

WHEN the duke of Bedford was lord lieutenant of Ireland, he was greatly alarmed by an unprecedented attack on parlia ment; and not without some apprehension of danger to his own person. But this strange and dangerous outrage was soon appeased, by the assistance of that part of the army which was then in the city, without any further ill consequence. But, as at the next meeting of the members of parliament, upon an enquiry into the authors and promoters of it, some of the very persons guilty in that respect, did, by their interest in both houses, endeavor to fix the odium of it on the obnoxious papists (to which conscious untruth and calumny, the war then carrying on against France, gave some kind of color); the catholics thought it high time publicly to vindicate their characters from that, and every other vile suspicion of disloyalty, by an address to his grace the lord lieutenant, testifying their warmest gratitude for the lenity they experienced under his majesty's go vernment, and their readiness to concur with the faithfullest and most zealous of his majesty's other subjects, in opposing, by every means in their power, all, both his foreign and do

It was on this occasion, that Prime Serjeant Stannard, a real patriot, and an unprejudiced honorable gentleman, in his speech in the house of commons, contrasting the riotous conduct of the Lucasians (as they were then called after their chief), with the quiet and dutiful behaviour of the Roman catholics, in that and other dangerous conjunctures, gave the following honorable testimony in favor of these latter: "We have lived amicably and in harmony among ourselves, and without any material party distinctions, for several years past, till within these few months; and during the late wicked rebellion in Scotland, we had the comfort and satisfaction to see that all was quiet here. And to the honor of the Roman catholics be it remembered, that not a man of them moved tongue, pen, or sword, upon the then, or the present occasion; and I am glad to find, that they have a grateful and proper sense of the mildness and moderation of our government. For my part, while they behave with duty and allegiance to the present establishment, I shall hold them as men in equal esteem with others, in every point but one; and while their private opinion interferes not with public tranquillity, I think their industry and allegiance ought to be encouraged."