146 State of Ireland. [Aua. 



which our late sovereign had solemnly sworn to preserve inviolate. In 

 several of those petitions the first fruits of the " Emancipation" Bill 

 the Roman Catholics pray for the total abolition of the property of the 

 established church, and that its clergy should be entirely thrown upon 

 the voluntary contributions of their own congregations. 



The Roman Catholics of Ireland are now praying for the abolition 

 of tithes. To this species of warfare their own clergy urged them, 

 when they saw no other method of annoying their antagonists, or of 

 deterring the Protestant clergy from exposing the rottenness of popery. 

 Their reverences cannot now conveniently eat their words, as they 

 would thereby considerably endanger their influence, being fully com- 

 mitted on this popular question. When they declared themselves 

 unwilling to receive any other emolument than that which they obtained 

 from tlieir flocks, and decried tithes as an oppressive tax upon the 

 industry of the peasant, it is very true that they did so in a paroxysm of 

 fury and despair, and merely exemplified the fable of the fox and the 

 grapes. But the deed cannot now be recalled. Thus, pressed forward 

 by the Roman Catholic demagogues, secretly favoured by the neces- 

 sities or avarice of the landed interests, as well as by the pressing exigen- 

 cies of the state, and not opposed with any vigour by the conscientious 

 Protestant, who often is more than half-disposed to regard it in the 

 light of an efficient bribe in the hands of profligate ministers, rather 

 than as a sacred fund for the support of men sincerely devoted to the 

 propagation of true religion, the demolition of church property in 

 Ireland may not be altogether so improbable as many persons suppose. 



We have hitherto dwelt chiefly on the effects of " emancipation" with 

 reference to the established church of Ireland. In a sense more 

 rigidly political, the consequences of the " healing measure" are vastly 

 more alarming to those persons who feel deeply interested in preserving 

 the present ownership of landed property, and the present arrangement 

 of parliamentary patronage, in that country. The attention of Roman 

 Catholics is now turned, in a very remarkable degree, to the confiscated 

 estates, the merits of the laws of settlement, and their general influence 

 on the prosperity of Ireland. They freely declare it as their opinion, 

 that the transfer of such enormous tracts of territory to the ancestors 

 of permanent absentees, such as the Duke of Devonshire, Earl Fitzwilliam, 

 the Marquis of Lansdowne, and a number of others similarly circum- 

 stanced, whom not even a repeal of the Union could bring to reside on 

 their Irish estates, is a crying evil. They quote the argument of the 

 liberal noblemen themselves, and those of their retainers in the lower 

 house of parliament, so frequently reiterated during the multiplied 

 debates on the popery question. These arguments they triumphantly 

 adduce as evidence, that the Irish confiscations were t( unjust in prin- 

 ciple," and consequently ought to be reversed. " Is it not admitted, ' 

 say the Roman Catholics, " that many of our patriotic ancestors were 

 driven into rebellion by a diabolical and long-continued system of 

 misrule ? and that others of them were subjected to forfeiture solely on 

 account of their loyalty to their king, and their affectionate attachment 

 to the religion of their forefathers ? Do not the Whigs uniformly admit 

 this? And is it not notorious that those unjust confiscations are an 

 insurmountable obstacle to the improvement of Ireland, by insuring 

 absenteeism, preventing the accumulation of Irish capital, the encourage- 

 ment of manufactures, or the patronage of the arts and sciences? 



