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UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS AT URBANA-CHAMPAIGN

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In Public Domain.
Published prior to 1923.

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THDE

CASE
OF

THE IRISH PROTESTANTS
IN RELATION TO

RULE

HOME

STATED.

BY

ONE

OF

THEM.

" I think it is not very unreasonable to suppose and believe that what
the Irish people have done before they will do again."
LORD

at Roessendale.
HARTINGTOTN,

D UBLINY:
WILLIAM

18 NASSAU

MCGEE,

LONDON :

SIMPKIN,

BELFAST : WM.

MARSH.ALL,
MUJLLAN AND

1886°

AND
SON.

STREET.
CO.

THE authorities consulted in writing this little book were :The Correspondence of Lord Clarendon when Lord Lieutenant of Ireland; Carte's Life of the Duke of Ormond;
Ralph's History of England ; Harris's Life of William III.;
Leland's History of Ireland; Dalrymple's Memoirs of Great
Britain and Ireland; Macaulay's History of England;
Ranke's Englische Geschichte ; Walpole's Kingdom of Ireland; Clarke's Life of James II. ; Archbishop King's State
of the Protestants of Ireland; Leslie's Answer to King;
Contemporary Pamphlets; The State Trials, Vol. 12; List
of Persons Attainted, and Acts passed by the Irish Parliament of 1689.
The Author has only to add that he is an Ulster Radical,
born and educated in the Northern Province, and that he is
come of that old Presbyterian stock which has contributed
so greatly to the prosperity and stability of the British
Empire.

44

ju

THE CASE OF THE IRISH PROTESTANTS
IN RELATION TO

HOME RULE STATED.

T is often asked why the Protestants of Ireland
are averse to Home Rule. The answer is clear:
Because of our affection to England, and our distrust
of a domestic legislature. We know that such a
legislature would be hostile to us, and that no guarantees could be devised to secure us in the possession
of our liberties, and to prevent a gradual encroachment on our rights. The lessons of the past have
taught us that our safety depends upon the connection
with England, and that without it we should be
exposed to organized injustice and oppression. We
have learned from history that the Irish or Celtic
party, when it possessed supreme power, abused the
opportunity to plunder the wealthy and industrious
Protestants; and we can see no change in the sentiments of a faction which has always displayed rancour
and race-hatred to us and the English.
B

2

THE CASE

OF THE IRISH PROTESTANTS

Our affection to England is as natural as that of a
child to its parent. We are bound to England, and
she to us, by ties such as never bound communities
before. The identity of religion, customs (what we
call law), language, and blood, has in all ages been
effectual to convert what was before a mere multitude
into a nation, and to bind them together in a union
close as that of a family. We know that one of these
circumstances alone-that of religion-is sufficient to
fuse together peoples differing in origin, in language,
in habits, and traditions; that when all are united to
influence men's minds, and their faith, customs, origin, and language are the same, an indivisible unity
arises which neither time nor distance can weaken.
The captive or the exile, though transported into a
new country, and surrounded by a strange people,
cannot forget the land of his fathers, or the associations among which he was born and lived. But
the life of the individual is short, and the duration of
his regrets limited. It is not so with communities.
Their memory, like their existence, is eternal, and the
remembrance and traditions of the past are transmitted
ever fresh and new from father to son and from generation to generation. Eighteen centuries have elapsed
since the dispersion of the Jews; yet the identity of
their religion, customs, language, and origin has preserved them as a separate and distinct nation from
those among whom they dwelt, whether their exist-

IN RELATION TO HOME RULE STATED.

ence was passed under the monarchies and republics
of Europe or the despotisms of the East. The history
of the western world does not furnish us with an
instance of a nationality dispersed among other nations, yet surviving its wreck and dispersion. But
the relations of a mother-country to her offshoots and
colonies witness to the indestructible strength of
such ties. A period of more than six hundred years
has passed since the migration of the Saxons into
Though separated by intervening
Transylvania.
nations from their fatherland, and surrounded by
strange peoples and strange tongues, they are Germans
still. Neither time, nor distance, nor intercourse
with those among whom they are intermixed have
changed them. Their external life and habits differ
from those around them, and remain the same that
they were in their ancient home. They have even
shared the religious movement of their far distant
fathers; and the same prayers which are said, and
the same hymns which are sung, in Germany, are this
day said and sung by the Saxons in Transylvania.
These feelings are not peculiar to any one race,
Jew, Saxon, or other. They are common to all communities which have ever been welded into union by
the identity of religion, customs, and consanguinity.
If other illustrations be needed, we can point to our
own colonies. New Englands and new English cities
have arisen beyond the seas; but nothing is changed,

4

THE CASE OF THE IRISH PROTESTANTS

save the locality and the climate. The old names
have been revived, the old customs observed, the old
life led, and the old altars set up. The children
cannot forget the mother; and though they have
wandered far from the old home, the magic of affection
makes them cleave to it and its sweet recollections.
Separation is abhorrent to them. One thing only
can divide what nature intended should be indivisible,
and break ties which nothing else could affect-the
refusal of the mother-country to incorporate her offspring with herself, and to take them closer to her
bosom. The greatest of her colonies-the States of
North America-not then United-desired to be fully
received into the constitution of England, and to be
incorporated into her national existence. England
refused, and her refusal divided for ever into two
branches the great and united English nation. The
same mistake is now to be repeated, and the Protestants of Ireland are threatened with separation
from their mother-country, and a forced partnership
with a population hostile to them, and differing in
blood, religion, and traditions, because that population
wishes to be dismembered from England. What
irony of history! The Americans complained that
they were not represented in Parliament, and that
they were not included in the Empire. The Irish
Celts complain that they are represented in an English
Parliament, and desire a legislature of their own and

IN RELATION TO HOME RULE STATED.

separation from England. They are now to be pacified with leave to depart out of the constitution,
while the Protestants of Ireland, who desire to remain
within it, are to be sacrificed to Celtic disloyalty, and
separated from England and their English and
Scotch brethren.
But it is not only that we are bound to England
by religion, customs, language, and consanguinity: we
have the same history and the same traditions. The
same past is consecrated by the labours and valour
of common ancestors and the remembrance of common
sufferings. While we remained at home among our
friends and relations, we shared with our English
brethren the vicissitudes of our common country-the
oppression of the Norman--the emergence of our
race to full citizenship under the Edwards-the long
wars with France-the political struggles under the
early kings-the desolation of the country in the
convulsions of the Roses-the reformation of religion
-the settlement of the kingdom under the illustrious
Since our
Elizabeth-and the great Revolution.
removal from England at the bidding and trusting to
the protection of her Government, there has been no
divergence in our history or traditions. No political
exertion has ever been made, no battle ever fought,
no expedition ever undertaken, no national movement
ever attempted by the English in which we have not
taken our part. The household words of the English
*B

6

THE CASE OF THE IRISH PROTESTANT

are our household words. Cressy and Agincourt,
Blenheim and Oudenarde, Minden and Waterloo, are
ours also.

We have shared the toil and heat of the
day, and are partakers in the common glory. Our
youths listen to the same tales of the past as the
English youths, and are trained up to follow the
example of their forefathers by the same memorials.
And in proof that they have been worthily trained,
we can appeal to what they have done. For we can
say, that to the thought and labour which have been
employed, and to the blood and treasure which have
been expended, in the making of England, we have
contributed

our share

as subjects of a common
Empire which we hoped would never be dismembered.
But, above and beyond all, we have a common
literature. Let those who would separate us from
England consider this fact alone. We are with the
English people joint owners and co-heirs of the
English Bible and William Shakespeare. In times
of affliction, and at the hour of death, we and they
have the same earthly comforter. In our griefs, on
the most sacred occasions of our lives, and at the
parting with our dear ones, the same words support
us, the same tones whisper hope. As in the family
the voice of the mother restrains, elevates, and binds
her children together in the silken ties of affection,
the English Bible preaches love and union to all the
members of the great English people, in whatever
country their lot may be cast. A people is not con-

IN RELATION TO HOME RULE STATED.

stituted by geographical limits and neighbourhood,
but by a union of hearts and hands. England does
not cease where her four seas begin, but extends to
every quarter of the globe where English hearts beat
and English hands work. And throughout that
greater England the English Bible, the seal and
visible representation of the unseen unity of our race,
has woven, and is ever weaving, bonds of affection
and union against which the arts of the alien and
traitor cannot prevail.
To strengthen, to guide, to raise us in the scale
of civilization, we have the same poets and the same
teachers. Shakespeare, Milton, and all their great
companions belong to us as much as they belong to
the parent English stem. We, too, can say"We speak the tongue that Shakespeare spoke,
The faith and morals hold that Milton held."

The possession of a common literature by communities means a perfect harmony between them in aim,
feeling, and morals. To have the same aspirations,
to take the same views on all social questions, to
think alike in all matters of conscience and duty, and
to have the same teachers and expounders, is union
indeed. But if we find that these communities were
before bound together by an identity of religion, customs, language, blood, and traditions, something
more than a union arises. It is rather a Fusion
complete and indivisible.

8

THE CASE OF THE IRISI

PROTESTANTS

The departure of a son, the separation of brethren,
is not the breaking up of the home, the disruption of
the family. Though another sky and another location may see the foundation of a new household, the
old ties are not slackened, the old bonds are not
weakened. The heart of the English exile remains
untravelled, and his spirit revisits in thought the
land of his fathers. To the Syrian leper, though the
Jordan brought healing, the rivers of Damascus were
better than all the waters of Israel. So is it with
the English emigrant. His heart cleaves to England,
to English forms of life, and English institutions.
In distant countries the old forms are revived, and
the old institutions reproduced. There is no instance
in the history of our race of an English offshoot
demanding separation. Secession was forced upon
America by England refusing her the inalienable
right of British subjects--representation when taxed.
The peculiarities of climate, distance, and the intervening waste of seas may necessitate a domestic
legislature in the remoter colonies, in Canada and
the Australias. But no such reason exists in the
case of Ireland. Twenty-five miles only separate us
from the shores of Great Britain, and our communication with her is measured, not by days, but by
hours. Even this distance is being daily diminished
by invention and the resources of civilization. Our
climate is the same as that of England, our customs

IN RELATION TO HOME RULE STATED.

and habits the same. Yet, without a reason urged,
without a complaint made against us, and without a
fault on our side, we are to be driven out of the
house of our fathers, and given over to a majority of
an alien and lower civilization. Well may we reecho the cry of those who are unfortunate without
being guilty--Ubi lapsi ; quic fecimus ? Without a
crime we are punished, without an offence we are
chastised. We are even denied the consolation of
contending in arms for our rights and liberties.
The command of England and our duty to her
restrain us. The same parent that ejects us from
our old home, and separates us from our English
and Scotch brethren, refuses us the last right of
freemen-to live under our native institutions, or die
in their defence.

Let us now consider the lessons of the past, and
learn from them what hopes we can entertain of the
justice or consideration of an Irish legislature. We
shall relate the short story of the last Roman Catholic
Parliament and the last Roman Catholic Government which exercised power in Ireland. Six generations are but a short time in the life of a nation.
The period which has elapsed since the last attempt
of the Irish nation at self-government does not
equal the lives of three aged men. The character

10

THE CASE OF THE IRISH PROTESTANTS

of a people is but slowly affected, and the Irish
Celt is as unchanging as the Church whose tenets
he professes.
The French, notwithstanding the
Roman and the Frankish intermixture, are the same
people which Caesar described two thousand years
ago; and their Irish kinsman remains unaltered by
time or time's teaching. The English race has
proved its capacity for absorbing alien and foreign
nationalities, Celts, Danes, Normans, and Germans.
But the Irish branch of the Celtic family has been
perennially averse to a union with England. Though
it has forgotten its own tongue, and accepted that of
the invader, and though it has borrowed its historians, poets, and statesmen-for of its own it has few
or none-from the English race, it has always refused
to coalesce loyally with the Saxon, and share his
labours and his progress. Dependent upon English
thought, and reared upon the same intellectual food
as the English, it has turned away from the breast
which nourished it, and refused to consider itself a
child of the household. Unlike its sister branches
in Scotland and Wales, it stands apart sullen and
unappeased, and is hostile to the Government which
protects it. Like a wounded animal, Celtic Irelandfor there is another Ireland,'

industrious, prosper-

1 It is hard on the Protestants of Ireland, that they, children of Great Britain, should be confounded, by their English
and Scotch brethren, under the common name of Irish, with

IN RELATION TO HOME RULE STATED.

11

ous, and cheerful-is always licking her sores and
nursing her anger. Her leaders are for ever raking
into the embers, or rather the burnt-out cinders, of
the past. To them there is no amnesty of complaints,
and the remembrance of mistakes and wrongs is ever
fresh. Time brings no limitation of offences, and no
healing on its wings. Without a single grievance in
the present, the self-styled Nationalists are for ever
talking of the old tyranny of England, and her old
oppression of Ireland. Not a word do they utter of
England's awakened conscience, or of her sincere
desire to remedy every wrong, and to conciliate every
subject throughout her Empire. The " Penal Laws,"
" English Interference with Irish Manufactures," and
" Grattan's Parliament," furnish the stock-in-trade of
the Irish agitator. Provided with these, a few quotations from Catholic compilations, and the panacea
of Home Rule, the mendicant patriot starts on his
travels. Trusting to Celtic antipathy to England
and English institutions, he ventilates the longwinded eloquence of his race, and dilates on the past
sufferings of Ireland and the iniquities of England.
An illiterate and excitable peasantry, from whom the
truth is carefully concealed, accepts the teachings of
the orator, and rewards his harangues with a money
subscription or a paid seat in Parliament.
a population Celtic in blood or traditions. Catholic or Celtic
Ireland is, and always has been, hostile to Great Britain;
Protestant Ireland is sprung from her loins.

12

THE CASE OF THE IRISH PROTESTANTS

History is philosophy teaching by example.
We shall not open her sacred pages with the intention
of misleading, but for the purpose of obtaining precedents for our guidance. In the past are to be found
the best directions for future conduct. We claim the
liberty of search which the Nationalists abuse. We
shall speak of the times and the crisis which furnish
them with their strongest denunciations of England,
and show, that the Penal Laws were not wantonly imposed upon an oppressed people, nor without justification; that the statesmen of that day considered
them to be necessary for the protection of English
and Irish Protestants; and that the misconduct of
the Irish people was the principal reason for the
enactment of those laws.
The Irish Protestants have not forgotten the
rebellion of 1641, with its massacres and endless
When, in consequence of the disconfusion.
sensions between Charles I. and his Parliament,
the attention of England was turned away from
Ireland, and her hand withdrawn, four different
parties arose, and for eight years ravaged the island.
The Irish are devoted and passionately attached to
their immediate leaders; but the larger patriotism
which embraces a country or an empire is as yet unknown to them. They have never advanced beyond
clanship, 1 and are, therefore, inclined to demagogy
1 The representatives of Celtic Ireland have lately furnished a remarkable proof of the truth of this statement.

IN RELATION TO HOME RULE STATED.

13

and faction. Excellent soldiers and servants when
under strict discipline, they are bad politicians, and
have always displayed a strange want of public sagacity. They are occupied exclusively with the present,
and appear to be unable to foresee, or make provision
for, the future. Hence their measures are rash, and
they themselves changeable and inconstant. Among
such a people, public and private dissensions had
their full swing during the eight disastrous years
which followed 1641. Europe has never witnessed
such a scene of discord and anarchy as prevailed in
this small island during this period. It is wearisome to read, it would be useless, if possible, to relate, the innumerable complications, transformations,
entrances, and exits, which took place. With their
fatal results we are acquainted. The historian 1 tells
us that " the desolation of the island was complete.
One-third of the people had perished, or been driven
into exile. Famine and plague had finished the
work of the sword. The fields lay uncultivated; and
the miserable remnants of the flying population were
driven to live on carrion and human corpses. The
wolves so increased in numbers, even round the city
of Dublin itself, that the counties were taxed for their
They have actually introduced a clan-an imperium in imperio-within the walls of Parliament. Each Parnellite member, contrary to his duty to the Empire, has bound himself
by a covenant to vote as others shall direct. The covenant
is fresh in the memory of our readers.
Walpole.

14

THE CASE OF THE IRISH PROTESTANTS

extermination, and rewards were paid of five pounds
for the head of a full-grown wolf, and two pounds
for that of a cub." Finally Cromwell landed in
1649, and restored some degree of law and order.
When the English regained possession of the
country, and the lands were distributed to the settlers in 1655, prosperity revived in a sudden and remarkable manner. We have three glowing pictures
of the prosperity of Ireland during the reign of

Charles II., and at the accession of James, drawn by
contemporaries and eye-witnesses-Chief Justice
Keating, Archbishop King, and a Protestant gentleman who took refuge in England from the troubles
of 1688. To that of Chief Justice Keating we shall
refer hereafter when describing the subsequent desolation. The agreement between these descriptions,
though by different hands, is very striking. Archbishop King tells us that at King James's " coming
to the crown, Ireland was in a most flourishing condition. Lands were everywhere improved, and rents
advanced to near double what they had been in a few
years before. The kingdom abounded with money;
trade flourished, even to the envy of our neighbours;
cities, especially Dublin, increased exceedingly ; gentlemen's seats were built or building everywhere; and
parks, enclosures, and other ornaments were carefully
promoted, insomuch that many places of the kingdom
equalled the improvements of England. And the

IN RELATION TO HOME RULE STATED.

15

king's revenue increased proportionably to the kingdom's advance in wealth, and was every day growing.
It amounted to more than three hundred thousand
pounds per annum-a sum sufficient to defray all the
expenses of the Crown, and to return yearly a considerable sum into England, to which this nation had
formerly been a constant expense."
The account 1 given by the refugee is equally
favourable. " By the favour of heaven upon the
extraordinary fertility of the land, Ireland was under
very auspicious circumstances. The Church flourished,
trade increased, the cities and towns were every year
enlarged with new additions, the country enriched
and beautified with houses and plantations; the
farms were loaden with stock, and ready and quick
markets there were to vent them. The laws had a
free and uninterrupted course, and a standing army
was so far from being a terror that they were the
comfort and security of the people. In a word, peace,
wealth, and plenty were become universal and epidemical, and all things conspired to a generous emulation with our mother and neighbour, England."
Nor was the condition of the Roman Catholic
subject less favourable than that of the country. The
position of the Irish Roman Catholic was very different
from, and far superior to, that of his English co' Apology for the Protestants of Ireland, 1689.

16

THE CASE OF THE IRISH PROTESTANTS

religionist. There was not a single effective enactment on the Statute Book 1 imposing any penalty on
Roman Catholics as such. In England every priest
who received a convert into the bosom of the Church
of Rome was liable to be hanged. In Ireland he
incurred no such danger.
"In England," says
Macaulay, " no man could hold office, or even earn
his livelihood as a barrister or a schoolmaster, without
previously taking the oath of supremacy; but in
Ireland a public functionary was not held to be under
the necessity of taking that oath unless it were formally tendered to him. It therefore did not exclude
from employment any person whom the Government
wished to promote. The sacramental test and the
declaration against transubstantiation were unknown;
nor was either House of Parliament closed against
any religious sect." In truth the state of the Roman
Catholics was much more favourable than that described by Macaulay. They enjoyed perfect freedom
of conscience and conduct. During the viceroyalty
of Lord Clarendon they were admitted as burgesses
to the corporations, and appointed Justices of the
Peace. Two circumstances which occurred so far
back as 1670, when Lord Berkeley was Lord Lieutenant, will show us in what condition they considered themselves to be. The first was, that in that
1The defect in the Irish Supremacy Act never having been
supplied. It was otherwise in England.

IN RELATION TO HOME RULE STATED.

17

year the titular Archbishop of Dublin appeared before
the Privy Council in his episcopal habits, of which
there had been no precedent since the Reformation.
The other was, the same ecclesiastic applied to the
Lord Lieutenant for the loan of some of the state
hangings, silver candlesticks, and other utensils, for
the purpose of making use of them at the celebration
of High Mass. Strange to say, the request was complied with.'
It was in such a country, prosperous beyond
measure, and in which the Catholic subject enjoyed a
freedom unknown to his English brother, that Tyrconnel and the priesthood entered upon a conspiracy
which was to end in the desolation of the island, and
the depression of their religion for more than a
century. Tyrconnel had long been the agent of the
Irish party at the English Court. He was supported
there by the Queen and Father Petre, though opposed
by the Privy Council and the House of Commons.
This latter assembly had even petitioned Charles II.,
in 1673, to dismiss him from all command, civil or
military, and to forbid his appearance at Court. If
but a part of what has been said of this man be true,
he was a prodigy of wickedness. Some virtues at
least enter into our conception of a political leader;
but Tyrconnel appears to have been deficient in every

'Harris,

Life of William III.

18

THE CASE OF THE IRISH PROTESTANTS

quality required. There was neither conscience,
veracity, nor prudence in the man. His fidelity is
even doubtful. 1 James could have no liking for one
who had boasted that he had been familiar with his
first wife. But Tyrconnel was the chosen agent and
leader of the Irish priesthood, and by their influence,
backed by that of the Queen and Father Petre, James
was forced to employ him, first as commander of the
forces in Ireland, and finally as Lord Deputy. The
recommendation of the Irish clergy in favour of
Tyrconnel is still extant. It was found amongst the
papers of Tyrrel, titular Bishop of Clogher, and secretary to Tyrconnel. An extract will show how highly
Tyrconnel and his services were valued by the Irish
clergy :-" And since of all others the Earl of Tyrconnel did first espouse and chiefly maintain, these
twenty-five years last past, the cause of your poor
oppressed Roman Catholic clergy, and is now the
only subject of your Majesty under whose fortune
and popularity in this kingdom we dare cheerfully
and with assurance own our loyalty and assert your
Majesty's interest, do make it our humble suit to
your Majesty, that you will be pleased to lodge your
authority over us in his hands, to the terror of the
factious and encouragement of your faithful subjects
At one time the inhabitants of Dublin suspected that he
was treating with William, and threatened to burn the castle

and himself in it.-D'Avaux, quoted by Ranke.

IN RELATION TO HOME RULE STATED.

19,

here. Since his dependence on your Majesty is so
great, that we doubt not but that they will receive
him with such acclamations as the long-captivated
Israelites did their redeemer Mordecai. And since
your Majesty in glory and power does equal the
mighty Ahasuerus, and the virtues and beauty of
your Queen is as true a parallel to his adored Hester,
we humbly beseech she may be heard as our great
patroness against that Haman 1 whose pride and ambition of being honoured as his master may have
hitherto kept us in slavery."
We may well wonder that the Irish clergy should
choose such a representative and leader. However
this may be, it is certain that they and Tyrconnel
began a conspiracy against the liberties, property,
and Church of the Protestants in Ireland. The aim
of the conspiracy was threefold: Roman Catholic
ascendency in this country, and the exclusion of Protestants from all civil and military employment; the
complete separation of Ireland from England; and
the restoration of the land to the Irish. The events
subsequent to the commencement of the year 1685,
and up to the landing of William, the conduct of the
Irish Government, and the legislation of the Irish
Parliament leave no doubt of the existence and aims
The means intended to effect
of this conspiracy.
1 Ormond.

20

THE CASE OF THE IRISH PROTESTANTS

these aims were, first, to get possession of the whole
civil, military, and judicial power in the nation;
secondly, to master the representation; and thirdly,
to call a Parliament which should give effect to their
policy. If there are minds so constituted as to
remain unconvinced by the logic of facts and conduct,
at least they cannot refuse credence to written testimony. Among the letters of the same Tyrrell there
was found one addressed to the king, in which
the programme of the conspirators was clearly explained, and this programme was afterwards literally
carried out. The letter is long, and in parts imperfect; but sufficient remains to indicate its scope and
meaning. The paragraph which refers to the means
to be adopted for working out the ends of the conspiracy is here given. The writer," after recommending the king to promote Catholics to "the most
eminent and profitable stations," and expressing a
fear that the Protestants in his English army would
be inclined to fight for the king, Parliament, and
Protestant religion against the King as Papist, his
Popish cabals, and popery, goes on to say : " To prevent which, as matters now stand, there is but one
sure and safe expedient, that is, to purge without
delay the rest of your Irish army, increase and make
it wholly Catholic; raise and train a Catholic militia
there; place Catholics at the helm of that kingdom;
issue out quo warrantos against all the corporations

IN RELATION TO HOME RULE STATED.

21

in it; put all employs, civil as well as military, into
Catholic hands. This done, call a Parliament of
loyal "-here the document is illegible for a few
lines.
But the sketch is complete, and we shall
soon see that the line of action recommended in this
letter was at once put into operation. The letter was
sent to James in August, 1686, while Lord Clarendon
was Lord Lieutenant, and Tyrconnel Commander-inchief in Ireland. The first step taken in prosecution
of the conspiracy was1. The Disarming of the Protestants.
The Duke of Ormond, when Lord Lieutenant, had
raised and armed a body of twenty thousand men, as
a militia, to protect the English settlers and to restrain the banditti which then infested the country.
At the time of Monmouth's rebellion in England it
was feared that this militia was well affected to his
claims, and an order came from England, while Lord
Granard and Primate Boyle were Lords Justices, that
its arms should be taken and deposited in magazines
in each of the counties. The carrying out of the
order was entrusted to Tyrconnel, and the militia was
disarmed. But this was not sufficient. It was resolved to disarm all the Protestants, and to deprive
them even of their private weapons, which were necessary for the defence of themselves or their houses.
Accordingly "it was given out that if any arms were

22

THE CASE OF THE IRISH PROTESTANTS

reserved under any pretence, such as that they were
their own and not belonging to the public, it would
be regarded as a proof of disaffection." The terror
inspired by this menace was so great that the Protestants delivered up the arms and weapons which they
had bought with their own money and for their own
protection. Though the settlers were obliged by the
terms of their patents of plantation to keep arms in
readiness for the king's service, and the country was
in a very disturbed condition, they were deprived of
all means of defence and left "without any one weapon
in their houses." x While this was being done, and the
Protestants disarmed, the native Irish were, on the
other hand, permitted by Tyrconnel to retain their
weapons. We have in Lord Clarendon's letters an
account of a warm debate which took place in the
Privy Council on this matter. Many of its membersfor the Protestants had not yet seceded from it-complained of the state of the country, and of the English settlers being left totally defenceless among a
peasantry who were hostile to the Protestants and
unwilling to aid them when attacked. The Lords
Justices who were present declared that they had
given orders to collect the arms of the militia only,
but admitted that those of private persons also had
been taken, under the pretence of disarming the
1

Clarendon.

IN RELA TION TO HOME RULE STATED.

23

militia. One of them, Lord Granard, added that
this was done, he knew not " by what officiousness."
We know by what, and by whose officiousness it was
done. This illegal measure was undertaken by Tyrconnel, and accomplished by him alone.
The natural consequences of this measure ensued.
No sooner had the English settlers been disarmed
than the banditti and rapparees issued from their
haunts and commenced their outrages against the
Protestants. Persons were set upon and dangerously
wounded in the open day. Houses were attacked,
and the flocks and herds of the English driven away
or destroyed. Crimes were so multiplied that Special
Commissions had to be issued to clear the jails
and, worst of all, the officers and soldiers of the
army, which Tyrconnel was then engaged in filling
up with Catholics, contributed to the outrages and
the general disorganisation of the kingdom. The
historian' tells us that these "new arms in new
hands were made use of as might have been expected. The soldiers harassed the inhabitants, and
lived upon them at free quarters. Tyrconnel, instead of punishing these offences, encouraged them."
When soldiers were taken red-handed in the commission of crime, they were claimed by their officers
from the civil power; and, in consequence of this
' Dalrymple.

24

THE CASE OF THE IRISH PROTESTANTS

conduct of the officers, magistrates refused to take
examinations where any of the army were concerned. 1
Lord Clarendon complains of the excesses even of
the officers, and mentions an extraordinary outrage
committed by one of them, Lord Brittas, on the
High Sheriff of a county. We give it in his own
words, and the instance will show to what a state the
country had been reduced. " The High Sheriff of
the county sent an injunction out of Chancery to
my Lord Brittas, to quit the possession of another
man with whom his lordship has a suit. My lord
beat the man most terribly who brought the injunction, and not being satisfied therewith, he took a file
of his men with him, found out where the sheriff
himself was, dragged him into the streets, and caused
him to be beaten most cruelly, saying he would
teach him how to carry himself towards the officers
of the king's army." If such an outrage could be
committed with impunity' against a high public
officer, it is easy to imagine the condition of private
persons.
These proceedings spread universal terror and
alarm, and their effects soon showed themselves in
Clarendon.
BThis crime was not punished.
1

for it to the Lord Lieutenant.
in the Dublin Parliament.

Lord Brittas apologized
This ruffian afterwards sat

IN RELATION TO HOME RULE STATED.

25

the decline of the country. Trade and agriculture
decayed rapidly; landlords hastened to sell their
estates for whatever could be got; merchants closed
their accounts, and withdrew themselves and their
stocks to England; farmers threw up their leases;
manufactories were shut up ; the revenue declined ;
an exodus, on a scale hitherto happily unknown in
these islands, began. As early as June, 1686, Lord
Clarendon writes--" It is impossible to tell you the
alterations that are grown in men within this month;
but the last week-for I am very inquisitive to be informed of those particulars-one hundred and twenty
people went in one ship from hence to Chester, and
multitudes are preparing, from all parts of the kingdom, to be gone as fast as they can get in their debts
and dispose of their stocks. Great sums of money are
brought to town, and more is daily coming up to be
sent away; and in regard the exchange is so high,
for it is risen twenty shillings in £100 within these
1 " I can myself give one instance of a man in the County
of Cork who, about eighteen months since, had forty looms
at work, and about six months since he put them all off ; has
given his landlord warning, for he was a great renter, that
he will leave his lands. There is another in the province of
Munster, likewise, who keeps five hundred families at work.
This man, sending to a tenant for £30 which he owed him,
was presently accused by the said tenant of having spoken

treasonable words."-Clarendon to his brother, 30th May,
1686.

26

THE CASE OF THE IRISH PROTESTANTS

four days, and that no returns, even at these high
rates, can be gotten into England, they are endeavouring to remit their money into France and
Holland, to draw it from thence hereafter at leisure.
In the meantime, there is no money in the country,
and the native commodities yield nothing. The
King's quit-rents and chimney-money come in very
slowly. To distrain signifies nothing or very little,
for the collector cannot sell the distress when he has
taken it, that is, nobody will buy it." And, again,
in August of the same year: "Those traders who
have got home their effects have withdrawn themselves and their stocks out of the kingdom, which is
undeniable matter of fact. I can name several who
paid the king many thousands a-year to his duty
who are absolutely gone, and left no factor to carry
on their trade, by which means several thousands of
natives, who were employed in spinning and carding
of wool, are discharged and have no work. There
are likewise multitudes of farmers and renters gone
to England, who, though they were not men of
estates, yet the improvements of the country and the
inland trade was chiefly carried on by them." In a
word, the desolation which afterwards, within a few
months, overtook the land was already settling down
upon it; and Ireland, which only two years ago,
was, as Chief Justice Keating called it, " the most
improved and most improving spot of ground in

IN RELATION TO HOME RULE STATED.

27

Europe," was fast becoming a desert. Most of the
English inhabitants fled, and art, industry, and
capital fled with them.
2. The Exclusion of Protestantsfrom the Army.
The army of Ireland, at the accession of James,
consisted of about seven thousand men, "as loyal
and as cordial to the king's service as anyone could
be; both officers and soldiers had been inured to it
for many years. They looked on him as their master
and father, entirely depending on him, and expecting nothing from anybody else. When Monmouth's
and Argyle's rebellion called for their assistance to
suppress them, no people in the world could show
more cheerfulness or forwardness than they did.
Most of the officers of this army had been so zealous
to serve the king, that they had by his permission
and encouragement bought their employments;
many of them had laid out their whole fortunes and
contracted debts to purchase a command."' Tyrconnel came to Ireland as general of the forces in
1686, with instructions to admit Catholics into the
army, which up to this time was exclusively Protestant. These instructions of the king implied no more
than that all subjects indiscriminately should be admitted to his service. Tyrconnel himself admitted
' King.

2:8

THE CASE OF THE IRISH PROTESTANTS

to Lord Clarendon that such was their meaning.
But his declarations that no distinction should he
made between Catholic and Protestant differed greatly
from the proceedings which at once commenced.
Within a short time after his arrival, between two
and three hundred officers were removed without any
reason assigned. These gentlemen, who had bought
their commissions, and many of whom had shed their
blood for the Crown, were dismissed without allowance or compensation. The letters of Lord Clarendon
are full of the many hard cases of these officers,
whom he knew to be good soldiers and loyal subjects, For some he pleaded with Tyrconnel in vain,
and others he recommended to the king and his
friends in England. The majority 1 went abroad,
and many of them took service in Holland, thus
swelling the number of William's friends and James's
enemies.
Of the persons who were appointed in
their stead all were Catholics, but this was the only
qualification required. The majority consisted of
such as were entirely ignorant of military duties, or
were taken from the meanest of the people. Some
had been grooms, some footmen, and some noted
marauders. Archbishop King mentions the case of
the famous rapparees, the Brannans, who were made
' One of these dismissed officers was Gustavus Hamilton,
afterwards Governor of Enniskillen, who did good service
f or King William.

IN RELATION TO HOME RULE STATED.

29

officers, and says that he had been informed that
there were at least twenty tories officers in one regiment, and that there were very few regiments without
some. Lord Clarendon complains of the excesses
committed by these new officers, and points to great
abuses committed by them with regard to the subsistence money of the army. " Scarce a colonel of
the army," he writes, "knows anything of his regiment." D'Avaux, in one of his despatches, informs
the French king that the colonels of the Irish army
were generally men of good family, who had never
seen service, but that the captains were butchers,
tailors, and shoemakers. 1
The change or remodelling of the army, as it was
termed, was not limited to the officers. Tyrconnel,
with equal brutality and disregard of common
humanity, disbanded between five and six thousand
The dismissal of the soldiers
common soldiers.
created even a greater sensation than that of the
officers, "because their clothes having been taken
from them when they were broke, they wandered, half
naked, through every part of the kingdom." 2 In
Dublin four hundred of the regiment of the Guards
S"La

k

plupart de ces regimens sont levez par dez gentils

hommes qui n'ont jamais estd l'armee. Ce sont des tailleurs,
des bouchers, des cordonniers, qui ont form6 les compagnies,
et qui en sont les capitaines."
SDalrymple.

30

THE CASE OF THE IRISH PROTESTANTS

were turned out in one day, three hundred of whom

had no " visible fault." 1 The same thing was done
at the same time throughout the country. The new
officers received orders to enlist none but Catholics.
"I will give you," says Lord Clarendon, " one
instance only: Mr. Nicholas Darcy, who has the
company late Captain Motloe's, called his company
together, and asked them if they went to Mass, to
which forty of them said 'no,' whereupon he immediately dismissed them, and said he had kept as
many above a week at his own house upon his own
charge, who, the next morning, were all admitted."
Of the class of recruits who replaced the veterans dismissed by Tyrconnel, let two contemporaries speak:
" When any new men are listed, they are sent to the
commissary to be sworn. The first thing they say
is, that they will not take the oath of supremacy; he
tells them he is not to tender it to them, therefore
they need not fear; that they are only to take the
oath of fidelity, which is the oath mentioned in my
instructions, and taken by the Roman Catholic judges.
That they swallow; and being asked whether they
understood what they have sworn, the answer was,
'yes, they had been sworn to be true to the Pope
and their religion; ' and being told by some that
they had been sworn to be true to the king, they

1Lord Clarendon.

IN RELATION TO HOME RULE STATED.

81

replied, 'their priest had told them they must take
no oath but to be true to the Pope.' " 1 The other
witness is Mr. Stafford, a Roman Catholic, who,
through the interest of his son, lately appointed a
Master in Chancery, had been made a Justice of the
Peace. In a charge to the grand jury, at the quarter
sessions held at Castlebar in October, 1686, this
gentleman naively remarked-" I shall not need to
say much concerning rogues and vagabonds, the
country being pretty well cleared of them, by reason
his Majesty has entertained them all in his service,
clothed them with red coats, and provided well for
them." 2

3. The Remodelling of the Courts of Justice.
Lord Clarendon was dismissed at the end of 1686,
and Tyrconnel arrived in Ireland, and was sworn in
as Lord Deputy on the 11th February, 1687. During
Clarendon's administration Sir Charles Porter had
been Lord Chancellor.
He had been originally
chosen because it was supposed he held strong opinions in favour of absolute authority. But latterly he
had shown himself restive at the proceedings of
Tyrconnel, and had taken occasion to declare publicly, that "he came not over to serve a turn, nor
would he act against his conscience." Accordingly
SClarendon.

2

lb.

32

THE CASE OF THE IRISH PROTESTANTS

he was dismissed, and Tyrconnel brought over with
him a ready-made Chancellor. One Alexander Fitton,
who had been detected in forgery at Westminster
and Chester, and fined by the House of Lords, was
taken out of prison and made Lord Chancellor of
Ireland. His single merit was that he was a convert
to Catholicism. A few circumstances of the many
related of this judge will give us an idea of his
fitness for this great post. He was in the habit of
declaring from the bench that all Protestants were
rogues, and that amongst forty thousand of them
there was not one who was not a traitor, a rebel, and
a villain. He overruled the common rules of practice and the law of the land, stating, at the same
time, that the Chancery was above all law, and that
no law could bind his conscience. After hearing a
cause between a Protestant and Catholic, he would
say that he would consult a divine, and he would
then retire to take the opinion of his chaplain, an
ecclesiastic educated in Spain. As assistants to the
Chancellor, Dr. Stafford,' a priest, and Felix O'Neill,
To these generally the
were appointed Masters.

'Ifthis Dr. Stafford was the army chaplain who at the
battle of Aughrim ran through the ranks of the Irish, exhorting them to fight for their country and religion, he was
a very heroic man. The other Master in Chancery, Felix
O'Neill, was afterwards transferred to the army, and made a

colonel.

IN RELATION TO HOME RULE STATED.

33

causes between Protestants and Catholics were referred, and upon their report the Chancellor passed
his orders and decrees.
In each of the Common Law Courts three judges
then sat. Up to 1684 these judges had been Protestants.
But when Tyrconnel came into power,
two Roman Catholics were at once appointed, and
one Protestant retained, " pinioned," as Archbishop
King expresses it, by his two brethren. The Protestant "to serve for a pretence of impartiality, and
yet to signify nothing," the two Catholics to secure
the majority. A Mr. Thomas Nugent, the son of an
attainted peer, " who had never been taken notice of
at the bar but for more than ordinary brogue and
ignorance of the law,"' and whom Lord Clarendon
calls " a very troublesome, impertinent creature," was
made Chief Justice of the King's Bench. The appointment of the son of an attainted person to decide whether the outlawries against his father and
others should be reversed, and whether the settlement of the lands should stand, boded no good to the
present possessors. Their fears were quickly verified.
Nugent, we are told, reversed the outlawries as fast as
they came before him. In all the cases between
Catholics and Protestants which came into his Court,
he was never known, in a single instance, to give
' King.

84

THE CASE OF THE IRISH PROTESTANTS

judgment for the latter. When accused persons were
acquitted on the palpable perjury of the witnesses
for the prosecution, he would not allow the witnesses
to be prosecuted, alleging that they had sworn for
the king, and that he believed the accused to be
guilty, though it could not be proved. He declared
from the bench on circuit that rapparees were necessary evils. We shall hereafter call attention to two
extravagant decisions of this judge. The other
members of this Court were Lyndon, a Protestant,
and Sir Brian O'Neal, an inveterate enemy of Englishmen and Protestants.
The Court of Exchequer was then the only one
from which there lay no appeal or writ of error into
England, and there was no check upon the reversal
of outlawries or restraint on decisions contrary to the
Acts of Settlement. In consequence the whole business of the kingdom, so far as it related to these
matters, and all actions of trespass and ejeetment,
were brought into this Court. Stephen Rice, an able
but intemperate Roman Catholic, was appointed
Chief Baron. His hostility to the Acts of Settlement and the Protestant interests was notorious.
Before he was made a judge, he was often beard to
say that he would drive a coach-and-six through
these Acts, and before they were repealed by the
Irish Parliament which afterwards sat in Dublin, he
frequently declared on the bench that they were

IN RELATION TO HOME RULE STATED.

35

against natural equity, and could not oblige. He
used to say from the same place that the Protestants
should have nothing from him but the utmost rigour
of the law. His Court, we are informed, " was immediately filled with Papist plaintiffs." Everyone
that had a forged deed or a false witness met with
favour and countenance from him; and he, knowing
that they could not bring his sentences to England
to be examined there, acted as a man that feared no
after-account or reckoning. It was before him that
all the charters in the kingdom were damned, and
that in a term or two, in such a manner that proved
him a man of despatch, though not of justice. If he
had been left alone, it was really believed that in a
few years he would, by some contrivance or other,
have given away most of the Protestant estates in
The companions on the bench of the
Ireland.'
Chief Baron were Sir Henry Lynch, equally hostile
to the Protestants, and Baron Worth, a Protestant.
The Court of Common Pleas was deserted, the
business of the kingdom being carried into the King's
Bench and the Exchequer. Two of the judges of
this Court were able, upright, and honourable menKeating, the Chief Justice, a Protestant, and Daly,
a Roman Catholic. In the correspondence of Lord
Clarendon Keating appears as the one dignified
King.

36

THE CASE OF THE IRISH PROTESTANTS

character of the letters, and he afterwards showed
his worth in the Privy Council before he was dismissed from that body, and by his very noble letter
to King James against the repeal of the Acts of
Settlement. Daly was also opposed to their repeal,
and was afterwards impeached by the Irish Parliament for having said in private that they were not a
parliament, but a mere rabble, such as at Naples had
thrown up their hats in honour of Massaniello. He
was only saved by the sudden joy of the Commons on
a false report that Londonderry had surrendered.'
The third judge was Peter Martin, a Catholic.

4. The Appointment of Catholic Sheriffs and
Justices of the Peace.
Tyrconnel, having remodelled the Courts of Justice
to his satisfaction, proceeded to secure to his creatures
" Tuesday, the 4th instant, we had an alarm that Derry
was burnt with bombs, that the king's army had taken it, and
put all in it to the sword, NIugent, of Car]andstown,
brought this news into the House of Commons just when
they were putting to the vote whether they should prosecute
the impeachment against Judge Dally. Some think Nugent,
being his friend, did it designedly, The news was received
with loud huzzas, and in that good and jolly humour they
acquitted the judge."-Letter from Dublin, June 12th, 1689,
attached to "The Journal of the Proceedings of the Parliament in Ireland, July 6th, 1689."

IN RELATION TO HOME RULE STATED.

87

the execution of the laws and the nomination of
juries. In 1685 Lord Clarendon drew up a list of
sheriffs for the following year. He tells us he bestowed particular care in making this list; that before making it, he had made enquiries from all
persons he could trust, and had taken advice from
all quarters respecting the nominations. He was so
well satisfied with it that he wrote to Lord Sunderland-" I will venture to say it is the best list of
sheriffs that has been for these many years, both for
loyalty, prudence, and impartiality."
Tyrconnel,
however, was not content with this selection of loyal,
prudent, and impartial gentlemen. He went over to
England, and there, though he had given no intimation in Ireland of his dissatisfaction, and though
he was aware who were on the roll before his departure, he complained to the king of Clarendon's
selection. The list was sent back to Clarendon with
objections, to which he was required to give an
answer. The objections were that the gentlemen
nominated were Cromwellians or tainted with Whiggism. The objections were satisfactorily answered,
and Clarendon's nominees were appointed. In 1686
Tyrconnel resolved that none should be appointed
but those of his own way of thinking. He and his
creature, Nugent, took the extreme step of drawing
up a list of those whom they wished to be appointed
for the following year, and presented it to the Lord

88

THE CASE OF THE IRISH PROTESTANTS

Lieutenant. Clarendon complained of their conduct
to the king. In a letter to James, 16th October,
1686, he writes-" I humbly beg your Majesty's permission upon this occasion to inform you that the
day before my Lord Tyrconnel went here, he and
Mr. Justice Nugent gave me a paper of the names of
the persons who were thought to be fit to be sheriffs
for the next year. I confess, sir, I thought it very
strange, to say no worse of it, for any two men to
take upon them to give a list of men for sheriffs over
the whole kingdom-to anticipate the representation of the judges, who are the proper persons to
offer men fit for those employments, and without so
much as leaving room for the Chief Governor to have
an opinion in the matter. This list is pretended to
be made indifferently of Roman Catholics and Protestants; but I am sure several of them, even of those
who are styled Protestants, are men no ways qualified
for such offices of trust." The king took no notice
of this complaint, and Tyrconnel was allowed to have
his way.
Lord Clarendon was right in saying that this list
was pretended to be made indifferently of Catholics
and Protestants. In 1687 there was but one
Protestant' sheriff appointed in all Ireland, and this
one was put in by mistake for another of the same
1 Charles Hamilton.

IN RELATION TO HOME RULE STATED.

89

Macaulay has, from
name who was a Catholic.
contemporary sources, left us a lively picture of these
sheriffs. "At the same time, the sheriffs, to whom
belonged the execution of writs and the nomination
of juries, were selected in almost every instance from
the caste which had, till very recently, been excluded
from all public trust. It was affirmed that some of
these important functionaries had been burned in
the hand for theft; others had] been servants to
Protestants, and the Protestants added, with bitter
scorn, that it was fortunate for the country when this
was the case, for that a menial who had cleaned the
plate and rubbed down the horse of an English
gentleman might pass for a civilized being when
compared with many of the native aristocracy whose
''
lives had been spent in coshering or marauding.
It was so difficult to find Catholics fit to fill this
office that many of those appointed for 1687 had to
be re-appointed for 1688. Harris informs us that
during these two years not a single instance can be
found of a Protestant recovering a debt by execution" because the poverty of the sheriffs was such that all
men were unwilling to trust an execution upon a
bond for twenty pounds into their hands, they not
being responsible for so small a sum, as many found
by too late an experience."
That the same interest might be predominant in
every part of the kingdom, the commissions of the.

40

THE CASE OF THE IRISH PROTESTANTS

peace underwent a similar regulation. It is true
that some few Protestants were continued in it; but
they wvere rendered useless and insignificant, being
overpowered by the great number of natives joined
with them, and " those, for the most part, of the very
scum of the people, and a great many whose fathers
had been executed for theft, robbery, or murder."'
So little regard was had to character that a man was
appointed chief magistrate in a northern city who
had been condemned to the gallows for his crimes.'
Of one of these justices we have already spoken-the
gentleman who stated from the bench that all the
rogues and vagabonds of the country had been swept
into the new modelled army.
5. The Attack on the Corporations.
But however large these strides were, they fell
short of the projects of Tyrconnel and his party.
Speedily as the forfeitures were being reversed, and
the land restored to the natives, they were not satisfied. He and they aimed at the total extirpation of
the English interest by means of an Irish Parliament.
The corporations, about a hundred in number, were
in the hands of the Protestants, and these bodies
enjoyed the right of sending representatives to the
legislature. Tyrconnel, having secured the appoint1 Harris.

2

Burdy.

IN RELATION TO HOME RULE STATED.

41

ment of native returning officers in the counties,
turned his attention to the towns.
The great
majority of these corporate towns had been founded
by the English settlers at their own cost and charge
to be the strongholds of their interest. Thirty of
them had been built in the reign of James I. alone,'
and almost every householder in them was an
English Protestant. The first attempt was made on
the Corporation of Dublin. Tyrconnel, now Lord
Deputy, sent for the Lord Mayor and aldermen, and
asked them to surrender their charter, stating that
the king had resolved to call in all the charters in
the country in order to enlarge their privileges. To
this request it was answered that a common council
would be called, and the matter laid before it. This
was done, and the Mayor was authorized to tell the
Deputy that the rights and privileges of the corporation were secured by one hundred and thirty
charters, and to pray him that their ancient government should be continued to them. Tyrconnel, as
usual with him, fell into a tempest of passion, rated
them soundly for their rebellion, and told them to
go their ways and resolve to obey, lest a worst thing
should befall them. ' Overwhelmed by these menaces
and reproaches, the Mayor called another council;
but the members persisted unanimously in refusing
1 Harris.

2 Ralph.

42

THE CASE OF THE IRISH PROTESTANTS,

to surrender their charters. To qualify the refusal a
deputation proceeded to the Castle, to acquaint
Tyrconnel with the reasons for their refusal, and to
pray for time to petition the king, who, on a former
occasion, had acknowledged their eminent sufferings
for his royal father, and assured them that he would
reward them therefor. With this acknowledgment
and promise Tyrconnel was now made acquainted,
He commenced to storm as
but without effect.
before, and said that instead of writing in their
favour to the king, he would write against them.'
A quo warranto was immediately issued against the
corporation. The case came on before Chief Baron
Rice in the Exchequer, into which Court this and
all the subsequent quo warrantos were brought, to
prevent writs of error into England. The corporation
was not allowed as much time to put in their plea as
was necessary to transcribe it. A date being mistaken by the clerk in one of their charters (we have
seen that they had a hundred and thirty), the corporation prayed leave to amend it. Leave was
refused, and judgment was given against them.
The fate which befell the corporation of the capital
was that of all the corporations in the country.
Within the short space of two terms-such was the
despatch of Tyrconnel's judges-the charters of all
1 Ralph.

IN RELATION TO HOME RULE STATED.

43

the corporations in the kingdom were forfeited or
superseded.
New charters were granted; but by these new
charters the corporations were made absolute slaves
to the caprice of the Lord Deputy. A clause was
inserted in all of them empowering Tyrconnel to
put in and turn out whom he pleased without trial
or reason shown. In filling up the new corporations
it was the general rule that two-thirds of the
members should be Catholics and one-third Protestants. The Protestants declined to serve at all. Of
the Catholics appointed, many never saw the town
for which they were named, nor were concerned in
trade; some were named for several corporations;
most of them were in indigent circumstances.' The
case of one illustrious town will explain to us the
sweeping changes wrought throughout the kingdom.
The charter of Londonderry 2 had been declared forfeited, and its corporation remodelled. Among its
new aldermen and burgesses, sixty-five in number,
there was only one person of English extraction,
and he had turned Catholic.
1 Harris.
" The same being done in all other corporations either by
voluntary resignation or a short trial, more for form than
with design to avoid it, it cost no great trouble except at
Londonderry (a stubborn people as they appeared afterwards),
who stood an obstinate suit, but were forced at last to undergo the same fate with the rest."--Clarke's James II.

44

THE CASE OF THE IRISH PROTESTANTS

6. Remodelling of the Privy Council.
The Privy Council in Ireland at this time had
duties, and acted a part in the constitution which
was not performed by the Privy Council in England.
No proposed Act could be introduced into the Irish
Legislature until the Lord Lieutenant and his council
had certified the causes and reasons for it. It became necessary, therefore, to remodel this body also.
A large number of Roman Catholics were introduced,
or rather drafted into it, for some who were named
for it were either ashamed or unwilling to accept the
honour. In May, 1686, twenty new members were
added, of whom eighteen were Catholics. Two were
Protestants, and one of them, Lord Granard, who
had been deprived of his regiment in the remodelling of the army, was appointed President of the

Council, an office until then unknown in Ireland.
Lord Granard declined to act. In fact, all the Protestant lords ceased to attend, " since they were so
vastly outnumbered as to prevent their doing either
the Protestants or their country service." 1
Thus was the whole military, civil, and administrative power in the country transferred to the native
Irish. The transference was undertaken by Tyrconnel with a light heart; but the cost of the opera-

1Harris.

IN RELATION TO HOME RULE STATED.

45

tion was the ruin of the English settlers and the
desolation of the kingdom. The first steps of Tyrconnel-the disarming of the Protestants, and their
exclusion from the army-had alarmed the settlers,
and stirred up against them an excitable and hostile
population. We have already spoken of the fatal
consequences of these proceedings. When it became
known that Tyrconnel had been appointed Lord
Deputy, the alarm became universal, and the exodus
of the English assumed a proportionate magnitude.
Every Protestant who was able withdrew himself
and his family to England or Scotland. So anxious
were men to be gone that they tempted the dangers
of the Irish Sea in skiffs and open boats. When Lord
Clarendon relinquished the Government, in 1687, to
Tyrconnel, fifteen hundred families left Ireland with
him. During the first year of Tyrconnel's administration the evils increased and the condition of the
country became still more deplorable. Lamentable
as this state was in 1687, the sufferings became
greater when in the winter of the following year the
army was increased. Fifty thousand ' Irish troops,
ill-disciplined and hostile to the Protestants, were let
loose on the country. At the same time large bodies
of the peasantry collected and ravaged the land un1 This is the lowest calculation. Ranke says: "Nach
den geringsten angaben wohlunterrichteter betrug sie doch
50,000 man."

46

THE CASE OF THE IRISH PROTESTANTS

checked., What few effects had been left to the
unfortunate Protestants were at once swept away.'
" The destruction of property which took place within
a few weeks," says Macaulay, "would be incredible
if it were not attested by witnesses unconnected with
each other and attached to very different interests.
There is a close and sometimes almost a verbal agreement between the descriptions given by Protestants,
who, during that reign of terror, escaped at the
hazard of their lives to England, and the descriptions
given by the envoys, commissaries, and captains of
Lewis. All agreed in declaring that it would take
many years to repair the waste which had been
wrought in a few weeks by the armed peasantry.
The French ambassador reported to his master that
in six weeks fifty thousand horned cattle had been
slain, and were rotting on the ground all over the
country. The number of sheep that were butchered
during the same time was popularly said to have
been three or four hundred thousand."
A patriotic eye-witness has left us two pictures of
the country which bring into glaring contrast the
past and the then present state of Ireland, and disclose the former prosperity and the latter desolation.
Chief Justice Keating, " whom all parties will own
to be a good man," 2 in his celebrated letter to King
SKeating's Letter to King James.

SClarendon.

TIN RELATION TO HOME RULE STATED.

47

James, in May, 1689, tells him how Ireland-" from
the most improved and improving spot of earth in
Europe; from stately herds and flocks; from plenty
of money at 7 or 8 per cent., whereby trade and
industry were encouraged, and all upon the security
of those Acts of Parliament; from great and convenient buildings newly erected in cities and other
corporations, to that degree that even the city of
Dublin is, since the passing of these Acts, and the
security and quiet promised from them, enlarged to
double what it was; and the shipping in divers ports
were five or six times more than ever was known before, to the vast increase of your Majesty's revenue "was reduced "to the saddest and most disconsolate
condition of any kingdom or country in Europe."
The same judge, who remembered what the country
had been only four years before, lamented at the
Assizes 1 at Wicklow, in language of extraordinary
earnestness and force, the miseries of the kingdom.
He told the Grand Jury that a great part of the
island was devastated by a rabble armed with unusual
weapons: "I mean half pikes and skeans; I must
tell you plainly it looks rather like a design to
massacre and murder than anything else. I am told
that open markets are set up in this county-a fat
bullock for five shillings and a fat sheep for one
shilling. Under the old law the Jews were not to
1

State Trials, vol. xii., 615 635.

48

THE CASE OF THE IRISH PROTESTANTS

seethe the kid in the mother's milk; but these unmerciful wretches go further than that, sparing none,
but destroying old and young. It would make every
honest man's heart to bleed to hear what I have
heard since I came into this county. It is ill in
other parts of the country; but here they spare not
even the wearing clothes and habits of women and
children, that they are forced to come abroad naked
without anything to cover their nakedness ; so that
besides the oath you have taken, and the obligation
of Christianity that lies upon you as Christians, I
conjure you by all that is sacred, and as ever you
expect eternal salvation, that you make diligent inquiry." In a subsequent case at the same Assizes
he renewed his complaint. " There are such general
and vast depredations in the country that many
honest men go to bed possessed of considerable stocks
of black and white cattle, gotten by great labour and
pains, the industry of their whole lives, and in the
morning when they arise not anything left them, but,
burned out of all, to go a begging, all being taken
away by rebels, thieves, and robbers, the sons of
violence. On this side the Cape of Good Hope,
where are the most brutish and barbarous people we
read of, there is none like the people of this country,
nor so great a desolation as in this kingdom. It is
come to that pass, that a man that loses the better
part of his substance chooses rather to let that, and

IN RELATION

TO HOMIE RULE STATED.

49

what he has besides, go, than come to give evidence.
And why ? Because he is certain to have his house
burnt and his throat cut if he appears against them.
Good God, what a pass are we come to! " In reading
these descriptions and lamentations it must never be
forgotten that up to this time, and long afterwards,
all Ireland south of Dublin was peaceful and free
from the ravages of war; yet the country had been
changed into a wilderness by the devastations of the
peasantry and the connivance of Tyrconnel's government.
The Protestants computed their losses during these
four years of misgovernment at eight millions of
money.' Macaulay points out that all such estimates
must be inexact. " We are not, however, absolutely
without materials for such an estimate. The Quakers
were neither a very numerous nor a very opulent
class. We can hardly suppose that they were more
than a fiftieth part of the Protestant population, or
that they possessed more than a fiftieth part of the
Protestant wealth of Ireland. They were, undoubtedly, better treated than any other Protestant
sect. James had always been partial to them. They
own that Tyrconnel did his best to protect them, and
they seem to have found favour even in the sight of
1Vindication of the Protestants of Ireland, 1689.
racter of the Protestants of Ireland, 1689.

Cha-

50

THE CASE OF THE IRISH PROTESTANTS

Yet the Quakers computed their
the rapparees.
losses at a hundred thousand pounds." If we take
into consideration what must have been spared to
the Quakers by the protection of Tyrconnel and the
favour of the rapparees, the estimate of their losses
by the Protestants will not appear to be exaggerated.
James landed at Kinsale, 12th March, 1689, and,
after a few days in Cork, proceeded to Dublin through
a country wasted and uncultivated, but which had
been, a few years before, covered with parks, enclosures, gardens, and corn-fields.'
He was now hastening to subjects among whom he
was to meet with nothing but slights, insults, and
open opposition to his policy. There was already,
all unknown to both parties, an absolute incompatibility between their aims. If ever a man was bound
to conciliate the Protestants of Ireland, it was James.
He was well aware that all the wealth and resources
of the island were in their possession, and that
nothing would strengthen the hands of his English
and Scotch friends, and allay the suspicions enter1 "it was impossible for the king to proceed immediately
to Dublin, for the southern counties had been so completely
laid waste by the banditti whom the priests had called to
arms, that the means of locomotion were not easily to be
Horses had become rarities ; in a large district
procured.
there were only two carts, and those D'Avaux pronounced

good for nothing."-MAcAULAY.

IN RELATION TO HOME RULE STATED.

51

tained of him, so much as justice and kindness to
the Irish Protestants. It would have been a complete answer to his enemies if he could have shown
that, in Ireland, where he was supported by the
majority, he had not only abstained from ill-treating
the Protestants, but had, on the contrary, protected
and supported them. Now that the heats of controversy have cooled, and new sources of information
been opened to us, we know that such was his intention. He saw clearly that his own interest and the
condition of the country demanded the conciliation
of the Protestants and the confirmation of the Acts
of Settlement. He, therefore, desired to call back
the fugitives who had taken refuge in England, offer
them a participation in the Government, and make
public his intention of preserving these Acts. He
proposed on his first arrival in Dublin to issue a proBut James was in the
clamation to this effect.'
and vindictive faction, who
hands of an improvident
made use of him solely for their own purposes, and
who compelled him to renounce a policy of amnesty
and conciliation. He was obliged to consent to
measures which he abhorred, and to see his own
ruin, and that of his family, consummated by the
Irish party. The aim of the king was to recover his
English throne, making Ireland his starting-point.
' Ranke.

52

THE CASE OF THE IRISH PROTESTANTS

Theirs was the threefold object which is sure to make
its appearance in every Irish agitation, whatever
may have been its commencement-Roman Catholic
ascendency, separation from England, and the posThe first the Irish had already
session of the land.
obtained by the means we have mentioned. They
were now about to make their final and fatal attempt
to secure the latter two. Tyrconnel and his party
had been for four years making their preparations for
a Parliament which should secure independence to
an Irish Legislature, and the restoration of the land
The hour was now come, and
to the natives.
on the 7th May, 1689, a Parliament assembled in
Dublin which has ever since been to all men
who are acquainted with its proceedings a world's
wonder.

The constitution of this Parliament was peculiar.
Out of ninety Protestant lords, only five temporal
Ten Roman
peers and four bishops attended.
Catholic peers had obeyed the writ of summons; but
by the reversal of old attainders and new creations,
seventeen more, all Roman Catholics, were introduced
into the house. Of the twenty-four Catholics who
generally attended, fifteen had had their attainders
reversed, and four were minors. No Catholic prelates were summoned. This was greatly against the
wish of the Parliament, who desired that all the
Protestant bishops should be excluded, and Roman

IN RELATION TO HOME RULE STATED.

53

Catholics summoned in their place.
It was the
work of the king, who still hoped against hope that
some moderation would be observed, and encouraged
the Protestant bishops in their attendance and opposition to the repeal of the Acts of Settlement.
This conduct of James was remarked with dislike,
and he was accused of being an Englishman, and of
showing too much lenity to the Protestants. A
Roman Catholic author and actor in these scenes
tells us that the king's conduct in the temple showed
him to be a good Catholic, but his conduct in the
senate proved him to be an Englishman. "
The House of Commons then consisted of three
hundred members, elected by the freeholders in
counties, and by the burgesses in corporations.
Tyrconnel took care to pack this house with his
creatures. We have seen how the sheriffs of counties and the corporations had been secured. To
make certain that none but safe men should be
returned, letters were sent with the writs recommending the persons whom Tyrconnel wished to be
elected. Upon the receipt of these letters, the sheriff
or magistrate assembled such as he thought fit, and
S" Diese Versammlung missbilligte, dass die Protesta-

nischen Bischofe nicht mit einem schlage entfernt, und
Catholische an ihre stelle gesetzt wurden."-RANKE.
2 Colonel Kelly.

Excidium Macarie.

54

THE CASE OF THE IRISH PROTESTANTS

these, without making any noise about it, made a
return, so that the Protestants either did not know
of the election, or were afraid to appear at it.' Two
hundred and thirty-two members were returned. Six
only were Protestants. Twenty-nine2 boroughs and
counties were not represented.
It was a Parliament so constituted that proceeded
to pass Acts " which seem to have been framed by
madmen."' The king, in his opening speech, had
referred in cautious terms to the Acts of Settlement:
" I shall most readily consent to the making of such
good, wholesome laws as may be for the good of the
nation, the improvement of trade, and relieving such
as have been injured by the late Acts of Settlement,
so far forth as may be consistent with reason, justice,
and the public good." These words have been tortured into an attack on these Acts; but nothing was
farther from James's thought than their repeal.
Many hard cases had undoubtedly occurred on the
former settlement of the nation, and it was the king's
wish that a sum of money should be set apart to
indemnify the sufferers. 4 But such moderation was
hateful to the Irish. A Bill for repealing the Acts
of Settlement was brought in by Chief Justice
Nugent, and received with an hurrah, "which more
1 Harris.
3

Dalrymple.

2

Harris says thirty-four.
Leslie.

IN RELATION

TO HOME RULE STATED.

55

resembled the behaviour of a crew of rapparees over
a rich booty than that of a senate appointed to
rectify abuses, and restore the rights of their fellowsubjects."' James did his best to prevent the Bill
passing. He even threatened to dissolve the Parliament. But his expostulations and remonstrances
only irritated the Irish against him. They said
openly, that if he did not give them back the land,
they would not fight for him. Even the soldiers in
the streets shouted the same thing after him as he
passed by.2 James still resisted, and at the last
moment resolved on a dissolution. But his evil
genius, s D'Avaux, stood beside him. The united
Irish and French factions were too strong for James
alone and unsupported. He yielded. " Alas," said
the unfortunate king, " I am fallen into the hands of
people who will ram that and much more down my
throat."
A general in the service of James was asked, a few
months later, how it was that the king had consented
to the Act of Attainder, and the repeal of the Acts of
Settlement. " Sir," was the answer, " did you but
know the circumstances the king is under, and the
2 Ranke ; Leslie.
i Ralph.
" It is not too much to say that of the difference between
right and wrong Avaux had no more notion than a brute."MAcAULAY. It was this man who proposed to James a
general massacre of the Protestants.

56

THE CASE OF THE IRISH PROTESTANTS

hardships these men put upon him, you would bemoan him with tears instead of blaming him. What
would you have him do ? All his other subjects have
deserted him; this is the only body of men he has
now to appear for him; he is in their hands, and
'
must please thiem."
James was obliged to yield. The Acts of Settlement were repealed, and fifteen millions of acres were
transferred to the Irish. The original Act of Settle-

had been confirmed by two subsequent Acts
and many patents, both of Charles and James. The
Lords Lieutenant, and judges on their circuits, had
been repeatedly ordered to proclaim the settled
resolution of these princes to maintain them.
ment

Trusting to the Acts and these frequent declarations,
the proprietors had reared stately buildings, and
carried out extensive improvements and reclamations
Seats had been erected and parks
of the soil.
enclosed. Many of the estates had passed into the
hands of purchasers for valuable consideration.
Manufactories had been established in divers places,
"whereby the meanest inhabitants were at once
enriched and civilized; it would hardly be believed
Thousands had
it were the same spot of earth." 3
sold small estates and freeholds in England,4 and
1 Leslie.
3 Keating.

14 Car. II., c. 2.
4 lb.
2

IN RELATION TO HOME RULE STATED.

57

laid out their prices in Irish land. Purchases,
settlements, leases, money investments, jointures for
widows, and portions for children-all the multifarious dispositions of property required by society
for the welfare of families, for its trade and commerce, or the reclamation, improvement, and adornment of the soil-had been made on the faith of these
Acts and an undisputed possession of many years.
All these were now swept away at one stroke, without
compensation or provision for the unhappy sufferers.
James alone, but he was an Englishman, manifested
compassion for these unfortunates. To make some
compensation for the evil inflicted against his will,
he gave ten thousand pounds a-year out of his own
estate.'
Well might Chief Justice Keating indignantly ask:
" Where or when shall a man purchase in this kingdom ? Under what title or on what security shall he
lay out his money, or secure the portions he designs
1Mr. Lecky thinks that compensation was provided.
There was indeed a nominal reprisal mentioned in the
Repeal Act, but (1) all who were related by blood, marriage,
or affinity to the possessors were excluded from this reprisal.
(2) This reprisal was to be future : no immediate compensation was spoken of. (3) It may be asked, Where was the
compensation to come from ? Fifteen millions of acres were
taken away, and the lands of William's adherents, which
were to furnish the means for this reprisal, did not amount
to a fifth part of this sum.

58

THE CASE OF THE IRISH PROTESTANTS

for his children, if he may not do it under the security of divers Acts of Parliament, the solemn and
reiterated declarations of his prince, and a quiet and
uninterrupted possession of twenty years together ?
And this is the case of thousands of families who are
purchasers under the Acts of Settlement and Explanations."
Lest some owners of land should be forgotten, or
not included in the sweeping net of this Act, a clause
was added whereby the property of all those who
dwelt or stayed in any part of the three kingdoms
which did not acknowledge James, or who aided or
corresponded with such since the 1st of August, 1688,
was declared to be forfeited. There was at this time
a constant and lively correspondence between Ireland
and England and between the rest of Ireland and the
north. So that everyone who had been in England
or the north of Ireland after the 1st August, 1688,
and everyone who corresponded with any such persons, lost his estate. " By a strain of severity at
once ridiculous and detestable, almost every Protestant in Ireland who could write was to be deprived of
his estate." 1 Nor was this a mere threat. Mr. Lecky
says that these words would, if strictly construed,
comprehend all Irish proprietors who were living
peacefully in England, or who had written on private
' Leland.

IN RELATION TO HOME RULE STATED.

59

business to anyone residing in a part of the kingdom
which acknowledged William. But he thinks they
were intended to include those only who had taken
an active part against James. Nugent, Tyrconnel's
Chief Justice of the King's Bench, entertained no
such doubts as to the effect of these words. This
judge decided that accepting and paying a bill of
exchange was a correspondence with the enemies of
King James. And in another case, where an attorney had received letters from clients asking him to
apply for a reprieve of sentence for them, Nugent
held that this also was a correspondence with the
enemy, and imprisoned the attorney on a charge of
high treason.
For the purpose of completely separating Ireland
from England, this Parliament passed an Act declaring the independence of the Irish Legislature, and
that the English Parliament possessed no authority
over it.
Thus at last was the dream of the Celtic Irish
fulfilled. Roman Catholic ascendency was complete;
the land was again in the possession of the natives;
and the last link which bound them to England broken.
All this was accomplished; but so also was the ruin of
their country, and an example was given to succeeding generations of the incapacity of the Irish for
self-government.
But the Dublin legislators were not satisfied with

60

THE CASE OF THE IRISH PROTESTANTS

these successes. Now that Ireland was her own mistress, a feeling which has always been a powerful
factor in Irish movements, race-hatred, made its
appearance.
James had been long aware of the
existence of this feeling. In a letter 1 to the king
Lord Clarendon reminds him of a former conversation which took place between them on this matter.
"When I had the honour to discourse with your
Majesty upon the affairs of this country, you were
pleased to say that you looked upon the differences
here to be rather between English and Irish than
between Catholic and Protestant; which certainly,
sir, is a most true notion." So strong was this
race-hatred, and so far was it carried at this
time, that the Celtic Irish proposed to exclude
from their party all Roman Catholics of English
descent.2 Not content with the impoverishment
and ruin of the Protestants, and urged on by their
antipathy to everything English, the Irish Legislature resolved upon their destruction, and extorted
the reluctant consent of James to " a portentous law
-a law without a parallel in the history of civilised
1 Letter to the King, 14th March, 1686.
" Aber vor ihren augen bekamen die nativistischen und
Ich
antienglischen Tendenzen in Irland die oberhand.
finde selbst, dass man damals die Katholiken englischer
herkunft auszuschliessen drohte, denn das seien eben die

schlimmsten feinde von Altirland."-RANKE.

IN RELATION TO HOME RULE STATED.

'

61

By this Act
nations-the great Act of Attainder."
two thousand four hundred and forty-five persons
were proscribed by name; of whom two were archbishops; one, a duke; sixty-three, temporal lords;
twenty-two, ladies ; seven, bishops; eighty-five,
knights and baronets ; eighty-three, clergymen ; and
two thousand one hundred and eighty-two, esquires,
gentlemen, and tradesmen. All these persons were
" declared and adjudged traitors convicted and attainted of high treason," and were to suffer, in the
words of the Act itself, " such pains of death, penalties, and forfeitures respectively as in cases of high
treason are accustomed," unless they, by certain days
fixed in the Act, surrendered themselves to such justice as was then administered to Prostestants in
Dublin.
The manner of inserting names on this record of
penalties and death, and the haste with which it was
drawn, were equally remarkable. Any member who
had a personal quarrel or enmity against another, or
desired his estate, or owed him a debt, had only to
hand in his name to the clerk at the table, and it was
inserted without discussion. No difficulty was made
in any case except that of Lord Strafford, and a few
words disposed of the objection. As to the haste
with which the list was drawn up, we are told that
"perhaps no man ever heard of such a crude, imper' Macaulay.

62

THE CASE OF THE IRISH PROTESTANTS

feet thing, so ill digested and composed, passed in
the world for a law. We find the same person
brought in under different qualifications. In one
place he is expressly allowed till the first of October
to come in and submit to trial, and yet in another
place he is attainted if he do not come in by the first
of September. Many are attainted by wrong names.
Many have their Christian names left out, and many
whose names and surnames are both put in are not
distinguished by any character whereby they may be
Owing to
known from others of the same name."
this haste, many escaped by accident, as did the
Fellows and Scholars of Trinity College, and many of
the king's adherents were included. The most remarkable of these were Dodwell, " the most learned

'

man of whom the Jacobite party could boast;"

2

Colonel Keating, who was then actually serving in
James's army before Derry; and Lord Mountjoy, who
was imprisoned in France, whither he had been sent
by Tyrconnel himself.'
1 King.
2 Who, for the unpardonable crime of having a small
estate in Mayo, had been attainted by the Popish Parliament at Dublin."-MAAuLAY.
3 We give short extracts from this list :
William Stowell, ironmon- William Covert, hosier.
ger.
Henry Rogers, merchant
taylor.
Symon Sherlock, brazier.
ArthurFisher, platemaker.
Henry Smith, haberdasher

IN RELATION TO HOME RULE STATED.

63

The savage cruelty of an Act which doomed thousands to the gallows and the quartering-block is
abhorrent to human nature; but the chicanery with
which it was conceived and carried out was even
more detestable. It has been mentioned that days
were fixed in the Act before which the attainted
persons must surrender themselves. It was known
that such a surrender was physically impossible.
The first of October was the latest date for surrendering. There was an exceedingly strict embargo laid
on all vessels in Ireland, so that not a single ship or
boat was suffered to pass thence to England before
the first of November. The embargo was equally
strict on the other side, so that it was impossible for
the attainted, even if they had notice of the law, to
return and surrender themselves. But good care was
taken that the sufferers should have no notice until
Vincent Bradston, pewterer.
John Wilson, gent.
John Speere.
Robert Hamilton.
Archibald Richardson.
James Mutray.
John Kearnes.
William Lee, Esq.
Elizabeth Lloyd, widdow.
Newcomen, widdow.
-Cassandra Palmer, widdow.

Wilson, wife to Mr. Wilson.
Stopford, widdow.
Jane, Lady Best.
Elias Best, her son.
Eccles, widdow.
Richard Clutterbuck, gent.
Erasmus Smyth, Esq.
William Watts, Esq.
John Evelin, gent.
--- Shapcoate, gent.
---- Page, gent.

64

THE CASE OF THE IRISH PROTESTANTS

the last day of grace had long expired. The Act
took away the power of pardon from the king, unless
the pardon was enrolled before the last day of
November. To prevent the attainted persons knowing that their names appeared on the list, it was kept
carefully concealed. Some Protestant adherents of
James were anxious to know whether any of their
friends had been proscribed, and tried to obtain a
sight of the list. Solicitation and bribery proved
vain. Not a single copy got abroad till the time
limited for pardon had expired.
When James
learned that the power of pardoning had been taken
from him by the Act, he was indignant, and remonThis
strated with Nagle, the Attorney-General.
officer had the impertinence to remind the king that
he had read the Act before giving his consent to it.
The king replied, that he had depended upon his
Attorney-General for drawing the Act, and that if
Nagle had drawn it so that there was no room for
pardoning, he had been false to his sovereign, and
had betrayed him. When the same Nagle, as
Speaker of the Commons, presented this Bill of
Attainder to James for his consent, he was not
ashamed to say that many were attainted upon
such evidence as fully satisfied the House, and the
rest were attainted "upon common fame." Nagle
SHarris and King say four months.

IN RELATION TO HOME RULE STATED.

65

was a Roman Catholic lawyer of repute, yet, on such
a solemn occasion, he did not hesitate to say that
common fame or report was sufficient evidence to
deprive so many citizens of their lives and fortunes.
All impartial readers of history are appalled
by the magnitude of this legislative scheme of spoliation and judicial murder. The Irish writers palliate, or,
what is more shameful, conceal it. They cannot see
that, in so doing, they make themselves participators
in the crime of their fathers, and that, in declining
to award historical justice to the misdeeds of their
ancestors, they unconsciously prove the hereditary
transmission of political incapacity to their race.
The rule of duty that recognition of the sin, and
acknowledgment of the error, is the first step to
repentance, is as true in public as in private life.
But this rule is unknown, or, if known, is not
practised, by these authors and apologists. O'Connor
calls the Act of Attainder a state engine. Plowden
says, it contains not one word relating to religious
distinction. Curry, M'Geoghegan, and Cusack are
silent respecting it. Haverty dismisses it as if it
referred merely to property. His words are: "As to
the Act of Attainder, passed on the same occasion,
its results, so far as the question of property was
concerned, would have been nearly identical with
those of the Act of Settlement, the persons who
would be affected by both being nearly the same."

66

THE CASE OF THE IRISH PROTESTANTS

It would be difficult to compose a sentence more
misleading.
Some of these writers have excused the Act of
Attainder on the ground that no blood was actually shed under its authority. As well might the
assassin who laid a spring-gun with the object of
murder excuse himself on the ground that his intended victim had returned by another path. Fortunately for those threatened by the Act, they were
beyond the reach of their vindictive enemies. Flight
had saved them. We can only judge of the intentions of men by their acts. If the Irish Legislature
did not desire blood, why were the pains and penalties
of death inserted in this enactment, when forfeiture
of property only would have effected the ruin of their
adversaries ? And why was the Act concealed till
the last day of grace had expired ? Why, too, was
the power of pardon withdrawn from the king ? As
long as these questions remain unanswered, there is
but one conclusion to which reasonable men can
come. And that conclusion is, that if the refugees
had returned, and the English Deliverer had not
appeared, there would have been another bloody page
added to the history of this country.
By an Act of this Parliament the payment of
tithes by Roman Catholics to the Protestant clergy
was abolished. For two years before the passing of
the Act hardly any tithes had been recovered by the

IN RELATION TO HOME RULE STATED.

67

Protestant clergy. The priests had begun, even so
early as 1686, to declare that the tithes belonged to
them, and they had forbidden the people to pay them
as the law required) They said openly that the
king, who was anxious to protect the Protestants,
had no power to interfere with the property of the
Church. The Dublin Parliament now confirmed this
violation of the law. To reduce the endowments of
the Protestant Church, says Macaulay, "without prejudice to existing interests, would have been a reform
worthy of a good prince and of a good Parliament.
But no such reform would satisfy the vindictive
bigots who sate at the King's Inns. By one sweeping Act the greater part of the tithe was transferred
from the Protestant to the Roman Catholic clergy;
and the existing incumbents were left, without one
farthing of compensation, to die of hunger."
There was a faint shadow of justice attending the
Act for the transference of the tithes to the Roman
Catholic priesthood, notwithstanding that vested
interests were cruelly and ruthlessly passed over.
Nothing can be said in favour of another law which
accompanied that for the abolition of tithes. At this
time there was hardly a Catholic householder in the
corporate towns and cities. These corporations, with
the exception of Dublin, Cork, and Waterford, had
' Lord Clarendon to the King, 14th August, 1686.

68

THE CASE OF THE IRISH PROTESTANTS

been built at the expense and charges of the Prdtestant settlers. In these towns a small rate or tax
had been imposed on houses by Act of Parliament,
and this tax was payable to the Protestant clergymen
who ministered there. This was, therefore, a niatte
exclusively between the Protestants and their own
clergy. James desired sincerely to protect the Protestant clergy, for they had espoused his interest
most cordially when he was Duke of York, and his
right to the succession questioned. But the Irish
legislators were resolved to make the country Catholic,
and they passed an Act abolishing these payments for
the maintenance of the Protestant ministers in towns
By these two Acts all the endowments of the Protestant Church, and all the provision made for the
maintenance of her clergy, were at one blow swept
away.
Her ministers were left to the charity of
their flocks, or death by starvation. It excites a
smile when we read that these two Acts were accompanied by a third in favour of liberty of conscience.
It was a strange conjunction, and worthy of this Parliament-liberty of conscience and the starvation of
ministers of religion. We must not, however, forget
that the Act for liberty of conscience was the work of
James, and that the other two proceeded from fanatics
and bigots.
SOne

of the Acts passed by this Parliament deserves more

notice than it has received.

It is an Act prohibiting the

IN RELATION TO HOME RULE STATED.

69

In the meantime the sins of the Executive fully
equalled the mad criminality of the Legislature.

We

do not here speak of the abasement of the coinage
and the innumerable oppressions committed under
and by means of it; 1 the second and third disarming

of the Protestants; the press for horses; the quarterings of soldiers; and the extortion and robberies

importation of English, Scotch, or Welsh coals into Ireland.
It recites : " Whereas it is likewise manifest that the great
quantity of English, Scotch, and Welsh coals hath not only
hindered the industry of several poor people and labourers
of this land, who might have employed themselves and
horses in supplying the city of Dublin and other places
within this kingdom with fuel, but hath likewise given
opportunity to the persons importing the said coals to see
the said places ruined for want of firing when they pleased,
or at least to raise the price of coals so high that the poor
should never be able to buy, by means whereof the said
colliers raised considerable fortunes to themselves, and carried vast sums of money yearly out of this kingdom." The
Act afterwards forbids the proprietors of Irish coal mines to
charge more than 9d. per barrel, Bristol measure.
' "A mortgage for a thousand pounds was cleared off by a
bag of counters made out of old kettles. The creditors, who
complained to the Court of Chancery, were told by Fitton to
take their money and be gone. But of all classes the tradesmen of Dublin, who were generally Protestants, were the
greatest losers. Any man who belonged to the caste
dominant might walk into a shop, lay on the counter a bit
of brass worth threepence, and carry off goods to the value
of half-a-guinea."-MAAULAY.

now

THE CASE OF THE IRISH PROTESTANTS

70

These things the Roman
committed by them.'
Catholic apologists have excused, on the ground that
a state of war prevailed, and that every Protestant
was a rebel at heart. We shall not even mention
the general seizure of Protestant schools throughout
the country, and the attack on Trinity College. But
there were other proceedings, to justify which no
attempt has ever been nade, and respecting which a
judicious silence has been observed. While the Irish
Legislature whs overturning the established order of
things, a persecution of the Protestants " as cruel as
that of Languedoc " 2 was raging, with the connivance
of the Government, through the three provinces which
owned James's authority. These provinces were quiet,
and their Protestant inhabitants made a merit of
their obedience. Yet they were obliged to witness
what the king himself called the general desolation

"

The misery of this town is very great, some being little

better than dragooned by the quartering of soldiers: some
have ten, some twelve, some twenty or thirty, quartered on
them; and yet I cannot find that, besides what came in today, there were above three thousand and odd men in town.
But the reason is plain : each man has many quarters, and
some captains make thirty or forty shillings a-week by them.
They come in by twelve, one, or two of the clock by night
to demand quarters, and turn people out of their beds, beat,
round, and sometimes rob thein."-.Letterfrom Dublin, Juie

12thM
16890

2
MaQcaulay.

IN

RELATION TO HOME RULE STATED.

71.

of the land, and to suffer, in James's words, "many
robberies, oppressions, and outrages, committed
through all parts of the kingdom to the utter ruin
thereof, and to the great scandal of the Government,
as well as of Christianity." There was a complete
relaxation of all civil and military authority 1 through
these provinces, though untouched by war. The
judges neglected their duties; the justices of the
peace acted illegally and in favour of malefactors,
and the officers and soldiers of the army contributed
to the general anarchy.2 All peasantries outrun the
wishes of their Government when they suppose those
wishes are favourable to them. The hints of further
rapine given in the Acts of Attainder and Repeal of
the Settlement were greedily received and speedily
acted on by that of Ireland." The Protestants were
scattered, unarmed and defenceless, among a hostile
and barbarous population, and the Government of
Tyrconnel connived at their ruin. When that is
1Instructions of James to the Commissioners of Oyer and
Terminer.
2 "Jamais troupes n'ont marchd come font celles-cy; ils
vont comme des bandits, et pillent tout ce qu'ils trouvent
en chemin."-D'AvAux.
a"The miserable usage in the country is unspeakable, and
every day like to be worse and worse; many allege that the
rapparees have secret orders to fall anew on the Protestants
that have anything left ; the ground of this may be their
pretending such an order, for they commonly pretend an
order for any mischief they have a mind to."-Letter from
Dublin, 1689.

72

THE CASE OF THE IRISH PROTESTANTS

said, all is said. The pathetic consists in details,
and the heart cannot take in more than one picture
of woe at the same time. The imagination cannot
conceive, language is inadequate to describe, the
sum-total of individual suffering comprised in the
ruin of a whole community.'
These accounts of the state of the country do not
rest on Protestant testimony alone. During the
winter of 1689 James issued, through his principal
Secretary of State," instructions to the judges, in
which he accused them of " having strangely
neglected the execution of their commissions," and
stated that this neglect was "the chiefest cause of
the general desolation of the country." These instructions are too long to be given in full; but as
they are strictly contemporaneous, and afford official
information of the state of Ireland, we shall quote
two paragraphs :-"

Let the general cries of the

people for justice, and the present general oppression
SAt this time a proclamation was published in England
by the Irish Government, without the king's knowledge,
declaring that the Protestants of Ireland were living under
James in the greatest freedom, quiet, and security, both as
to their properties and religion. Some Scotch officers, who
in the winter of 1689 came over to Dublin, said that if their
countrymen had known how the Protestants had been
treated in Ireland, not a man of them would have fought
for the king.
2
White, an Irish Catholic, created Marquis D'Albaville

by the King of Spain.

IN RELATION TO HOME RULE STATED.

73

under which the country groans, move you to have
compassion of it, and to raise in you such a public
spirit as may save it from this inundation of miseries
that breaks upon it by a neglect of his Majesty's
orders, and by a general relaxation of all civil and
military laws. Consider that our enemies, leaving us
to ourselves, as they do, conclude we shall prove
greater enemies to one another than they can be to
us, and that we will destroy the country and enslave
ourselves more than they are able to do. What
inhumanities are daily committed against one another
gives but too much ground to the truth of what our
enemies conclude of us."
But James's endeavours to reduce the general
anarchy, and to restore some degree of law and
order, were fruitless. His authority was neglected,
and in every step he took he was thwarted and
disobeyed by the Irish faction which had him in
their power. His unwillingness to consent to the
Acts of Attainder and Repeal of the Settlement,
his struggles to protect his Protestant subjects,
and his anxiety for the administration of justice, and the punishment of malefactors, had made
There was already
him thoroughly unpopular.
gathering about him that hatred which has attended
his memory in this country, and has attached to his
name in Irish a filthy and disgusting word. To the
natives James was a foreigner and an Englishman.

74

THE CASE OF THE IRISH PROTESTANTS

To the civilized King of England the Irish schemes
of extirpation and revenge were hateful and abhorrent. 1
It has been denied that the churches of the Protestants were seized by the Roman Catholics. Nothing
can be more true than that this was done. It is
proved beyond all doubt by the petitions of the Protestants, and by James's proclamation, 2 declaring that
the seizure of churches was a violation of his Act for
liberty of conscience. Archbishop King asserts that
nine churches out of ten were taken possession of
throughout the country, twenty-six alone in the
diocese of Dublin. Leslie denies that a single church,
except Christ Church, and that only because it was
reputed the king's chapel, was taken by the order or
connivance of the king. The assertion and denial
are both true. James, we know now, was sincerely
desirous to protect the Protestant clergy, and thus to
' But. above all, some of them movring to him for leave to
cut off the Protestants, which he refused with indignation
and amazement, saying, 'What, gentlemen, are you for
another forty-one ? '-which so galled them that they ever
after looked upon him with a jealous eye, and thought him,
though a Roman Catholic, too much an Englishman to carry
on their business."-LESLIE.
2 " The king published soon after a proclamation for surrendering all the Protestant churches which had been seized
upon by the Catholics, and took great care to have all
grievances of that nature redressed."-CLARKE's James II.

IN RELATION TO HOME RULE STATED.

75

disprove the allegations of his enemies that his liberty
of conscience was but a mask assumed for an occasion. But we must draw a distinction between James
and the Irish ministers who surrounded him. The
latter connived at the claims of the Roman Catholic
priesthood and the excesses 6f an excited population.
When the king gave a positive order that the church
at Wexford should be restored to the Protestants, the
order was eluded or disbbeyed by his ministers.
Tyrconnel's Government even proceeded so far as to
fbrbid, contrary to the Act for liberty of conscience,
the Protestants to assemble in churches or elsewhere
on pain of death.' Yet this was the Act upon which
James rested his hopes of regaining his English
throne and conciliating his English subjects.
Leslie, upon whose statements the Irish writers
rely, insists strongly upon this distinction between
the king and his Irish ministrs, lHe says : "Before
I enter upon this disquisition I desire to obviate one
objection which I know will be made. As if I were
about wholly to vindicate all that Lord Tyrconnel and
other of King James's ministers have done in Ireland,
especially before this revolution began, and which
most of anything brought it on. No; I am far from
it. I am sensible that their carriage in many particulars gave greater occasion to King James's enemies
than all the other maladministrations which were
SDalrymple,

76

THE CASE OF THE IRISI

PROTESTANTS

charged against his Government." And in another
place he repeats the statement:o I am very sensible
of the many ill steps which were made in King
James's Government, and above all of the mischievous
consequences of Lord Tyreonnel's administration,
which the most of any one thing brought on the misfortunes of his master."
The conduct of the last Roman Catholic Legislature
and of the last Roman Catholic administration which
possessed power in Ireland was undoubtedly the chief
cause, and, to the statesmen of that day, the justification, of the penal laws which were afterwards enacted.
During their short lease of government, the Irish
Catholics had shown themselves resolved not merely
on the ruin, but on the actual extirpation, of the Protestant interest. Was it to be wondered at, when the
Protestants returned to power, that they should determine to exclude a class that had attempted a vast
spoliation and slaughter, and conducted a relentless
persecution against them, from the government of a
country which they had brought to desolation ? Or
that all ranks-nobles, gentry, traders, and yeomenfor all had been equally threatened and equally persecuted-should unite to reduce them to political impotence? We cannot at the present day form an
adequate idea of the alarm of the English and Irish
Protestants without taking into consideration the
treatment which their party met with in the rest of
Europe. We must remember that the Dublin scheme

IN iELATTON TO HOME RULE STATED.

77

of spoliation and judicial murder was almost contemporaneous with the dragonnades of Louis and the
persecution of the Huguenots, and that the Irish
were hostile to the connection with England, and
passionately desired a separate Government under the
protection of France. If we keep these considerations
before us, we cannot be surprised that the Protestants
of Ireland proposed, and that the Privy Council of
England, whose assent was then required to Irish
legislation, should concur in, measures which secured
both nations against the machinations of their irreconcilable enemies. It was absolutely necessary for
England, at the commencement of the eighteenth
century, to weaken the power of the Irish to give aid
to her ancient enemy. The penal laws were not
wantonly imposed by a dominant class upon an
oppressed people, nor were they entirely unjustifiable.
They were provoked by the Irish schemes of extermination and separation from England. Sharp and
decisive measures were necessary to restrain the
eternal disloyalty of the Irish and their perpetual
enmity to England and the English. These enactments erred on the side of severity, and retaliation
intruded on the domain of legislation. But the Protestants would have been more than mortal if they
had quite forgotten the long agony of their ruin, their
sufferings, and the bitter persecution directed against
them-a persecution which, though it was the last
which they had to suffer in Europe, was perhaps the

78

THE CASE OF THE IRISH PROTESTANTS

most complete, inasmuch as it was aimed, not at their
conversion, but at their destruction. The facts of
history must be faced, not shirked. If ever a nation
drew upon itself a retribution for past misdeeds, it
was the Irish nation at this period. To the crimes
of their chosen leaders, and to their own, the Celtic
Irish owed in great pait their subsequent long depression and their political extinction.
The Protestants of Ireland ask their English and
Scotch brethren what security is there, if a separate
Parliament be granted, that such legislative and
executive misconduct as we have detailed shall not
be repeated. That such judges as Fitton and Nugent
shall not sit on the bench. That Protestants shall
not be discouraged or debarred from entering the
constabulary, and a purely Catholic army thus be
formed. And that a jealous peasantry shall not
again be let loose to wreak its vengeance on a higher
civilization. There are offences which may be committed within the law, and crime can assume the
appearance of justice. A friendly construction may
set free the criminal, and paralyze the rod of chastisement. What imperial laws, what imperial guarantees,
can avail against the wrongful interpretation of those
laws and guarantees by the local Legislature and the
local Courts, and against the connivance of the Executive at their violation ? For when the offender and
the judge are the same individual, there is but little
hope of justice being done. What provisions can be

IN RELATION TO HOME RULE STATED.

79

made effective against the chicanery and equivocation
which observe the letter of the law while they transgress its spirit, and which " keep the word of promise to our ear and break it to our hope"? The
answer is-It is beyond the wit of man to devise
restraints which can prevent a people from following
their own ways, and carrying out their fixed intentions, All such attempts are vain; and to give the
name of safeguards or guarantees to illusory provisions is to deceive, and, instead of living truths, to
offer unsubstantial pretences.
The Irish Protestants are not afraid of immediate
open violence. They have arms in their hands, and
their lives at least are under the protection of England.
they do fear is, that their rights and
liberties would be slowly but surely encroached upon,
and gradually frittered away; that the freedom of
educating their children would be denied them; and
that their schools and colleges 1 would, one by one,
pass into the possession of the enemies of progress.
They know that an Irish Parliament would be dominated by an intolerant priesthood, and by a majority
elected by an illiterate peasantry wholly under the
influence of that priesthood. The sudden and unexpected reappearance of religious animosity in the

'What

1The Roman Catholic Archbishop of Dublin, Dr. Walsh,
has stated publicly that he must have Trinity College,
Dublin.

80

THE CASE OF THE IRISH PROTESTANTS

country, and the public declarations of Roman Catholic ecclesiastics, foreshadow but too clearly the treatment which Protestants and Protestant education
would receive. With some sacrifices to appearances,
and some pretence of toleration, the old claims, which
are now openly enunciated, would be enforced, and
the old persecution under another name and form
would be revived. Protestant freedom of thought,
Protestant progress, and Protestant industry would
disappear from the country, and Ireland might, fifty
years hence, realize the dream of the priesthood, and
be, in mental darkness, in the backwardness of her
children, and in the severity of her laws for uniformity of worship, the model Catholic country of the
world.
It is instructive to compare O'Connell's original
conception of a Repeal of the Union with its later
development. O'Connell founded the Repeal Association on the 15th April, 1840. At this time he was
an old man; but long habit, and a life of agitation,
had unfitted him for rest. In a letter, dated the
8th April, to Dr. MacHale, he unfolds his scheme.

"

My present plan, it is this-To organise a Justice or
Repeal Association. The justice I require branches itself
into four different heads of grievance:"1. The payment and support, by the State in Ireland, of
the Church of the minority of the Irish people.
This is the first and greatest of our grievances.

81

IN RELATION TO HOME RULE STATED.

" 2. The omission to give the Irish full corporate reform.
" 3. The omission to give the people of Ireland an adequate share of Parliamentary representation.
" 4. The omission to give the Irish people the same political franchise which the people of England enjoy.
" The Association I propose will organise, I hope, the
Irish people to insist on the redress, the full redress, of these
grievances from the Imperial Parliament, and if not speedily
and fully granted by that Parliament, then from a restored
domestic Legislature."

Two considerations suggest themselves on reading
this programme of agitation. The first is, that all
these grievances have been redressed. In fact, the
foundation on which O'Connell rested his agitation
has been removed. The second is, that O'Connell,
the representative Irishman, entertained no sentimental feeling about the independence of an Irish
Legislature, and no wish for a separation from England. All he wanted was the redress of his four
grievances. He was eminently practical. If the
Imperial Legislature removed the causes of complaint,
he was satisfied. If not, and only then, the restoration of a domestic Parliament was to be sought.
The change in the agitation since O'Connell's
demands is remarkable. The old hopes have revived.
A comparison of the aims of the present agitators
with those of the Irish in King James's days will
establish their identity. The objects of the Irish in
1689 were, the restoration of the land to the nativesG

82

THE CASE OF THE IRISH PROTESTANTS

complete separation of Ireland from England-Roman
Catholic ascendency, and the exclusion of Protestants
from all civil and military employment. The aims
of the Nationalists are the same. If anyone doubt
this, let him consider well their proceedings and
their public declarations. The restoration of the
land is being gradually but surely accomplished by
the coercion of the National League and the crusade
against rent. We are not left in doubt as to the
other two. Mr. Parnell's utterances are clear and
distinct. In speeches which he delivered before Irish
volunteers in America, he said, " Oh, that I could
carry these arms for Ireland. Well, it may come to
that some day or other. None of us, whether we are
in America or in Ireland, or wherever we may be,
will be satisfied until we have destroyed the last link
which keeps Ireland bound to England." At Castlebar he declared, "We will never accept anything but
the full and complete right to arrange our own
affairs, and make our land a nation; to secure for
her, free from outside control, the right to direct our
own course among the peoples of the world." At
Cork he told his hearers, "If we succeed in emigrating the Irish landlords, the English Government will
soon have to follow them." And at Wexford he
boasted that, "as Mr. Gladstone, by the Act of 1881,
had eaten all his own words, and had departed from
all his formerly declared principles, now we shall see

IN RELATION TO HOME RULE STATED.

83

that these brave words' of the English Prime Minister
will be scattered as chaff before the united and advancing determination of the Irish people to regain
for themselves their lost land, and their lost legislative independence."
The demand for Roman Catholic ascendency, and
the exclusion of Protestants from employments, has
Cardinal
been as explicitly and solemnly made.
in a pastoral, directed that no legal or
McCabe,
medical man should be employed by Catholics, unless
he had prosecuted his studies in the Royal University. And the Rev. Mr. Behan, on a late occasion,
gave full expression to this demand. " They [the
Nationalists] were not struggling merely for a green
flag. They wanted three meals a-day, good clothes
on their backs, and employment for honest men.
The election was over, and the real struggle was to
begin now. What they wanted now was the spoils,
the loaves and fishes of all those fellows who had the
monopoly up to this. They wanted men of their own
to be officials for this country; to fill every situation
and every occupation they were qualified for, from the
highest to the lowest. And the topmost man in the
Castle must make way for one of theirs; and the
lowest official in the poorhouse yonder must be re1Alluding to Mr. Gladstone's speech, in which that gentleman said, " The resources of civilisation are not yet exhausted."

84

THE CASE OF THE IRISH PROTESTANTS.

placed by one of theirs. What did their opponents
do in their day? They kept everything to themselves,
and now they might thank God if they [the Nationalists] gave them raw and unboiled justice."
This is ascendency indeed, pure and simple; and
the exclusion of their opponents is openly stated by
this gentleman to be the object of the Irish partyRoman Catholics to be officials in the country, and
to fill every situation and every occupation, from the
highest to the lowest! The speaker is careful to
point out that the party was not struggling for a
national sentiment, "for a green flag," ashe expresse
it, but for mere material plunder. The Irish Protestants have here their future position marked out
clearly and distinctly.
The land which we have
civilised is to know us no more, except as hewers of
wood and drawers of water. Excluded from every
office and every employment, civil and military, we
are to pass our lives without progress or hope of
advancement. The professions are to be closed to
our children, and the rewards of cultivation withdrawn from us. For if the faction with which the
Catholic priesthood has coalesced be successful, and
an Irish-Celtic Parliament established, there will not
be a career open to an educated Protestant in Ireland,
outside of Belfast and the northern towns.

C. W. GIBBS, Printer, i8 Wicklow Street, Dublin.

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