624 Catholic Resolutions : [JUNE, 



He can cast away his office to-morrow, without a remembrance, if he 

 thinks fit to do so; which is one of the very first reasons why he is 

 likely to be very little molested in it. If he does hold office the 

 very multitude know and feel this he will hold it on his own terms. 

 He has a station, a character, a fortune, to fall back upon, quit power 

 when he will, which are equal must be equal to man's highest 

 ambition ; arid of which the powers of no influence, the abuse of no 

 party, can deprive him. Minister or not ministry is not his trade, 

 though he has shewn those who treated him as a mere soldier, that he 

 can do something in it; but, minister or no minister commander- 

 in-chief, or no commander he has earned his position he is " TIIK 

 DUKE OF WELLINGTON" the man who reversed the tide of Napoleon's 

 fortunes, and carried the arms of England from the shores of Lisbon to 

 the gates of Paris ; and whose fame will endure for ages in the records 

 of history, when the arrogancies of those who possess mere power, and the 

 wranglings of those who aspire to it, shall be alike forgotten. The Duke 

 of Wellington, from his position, has the power to defy cabal or clamour : 

 and he holds that power just as equally for purposes of good or of evil. 

 If a man situated and gifted as he is, can have any thing on earth worth 

 gaining any addition to his fortunes worth wishing for it must be 

 high opinion popularity? He knows it will be admitted he knows 

 so much as this that popularity is more likely to be obtained by carry- 

 ing measures which may benefit society, than by opposing them ; and, 

 is it less than reasonable, therefore unless we had evidence to the 

 contrary to infer, that it is in favour of that course which he believes 

 to be beneficial, that his power and influence will be directed ? For 

 these reasons it is that we do not yet despair of seeing the Duke of 

 Wellington acting for, if once he believes, he will certainly act 

 in favour of an accommodation of the Catholic claims. He is now in 

 office; clothed with authority and its result, responsibility. He 

 will look at the question with a more anxious attention now that 

 he himself must decide it ; and a soldier, because he did not happen to 

 see an advantage yesterday, feels no scruple in taking the full benefit of 

 it to-day. The recent repeal of the Test and Corporation Acts in 

 England, shews that he can see the folly of a system which annoys vast 

 bodies of men, without producing advantage to any single individual :- 

 and, whatever may be the opinion of those parties whose business it is 

 to make speeches year after year upon such subjects to us the repeal of 

 those acts seems to form the recognition of a principle, of which it is 

 impossible that the Roman Catholics should not speedily receive the 

 benefit. 



But we are straying from the purpose with which this paper was 

 commenced ; which was, less to discuss the general policy of the Catho-i 

 lie Question, than to notice a few of the arguments employed by some 

 of its chief supporters in the recent debate in the House of Commons. An 

 enormous deal of nonsense was uttered on both sides of the House ; a re- 

 sult, perhaps, hardly separable from the repeated discussion of a question ; 

 upon which a given quantity of talking is considered the annual etiquette, 

 and in which every, man tries if it is not possible to utter something which 

 shall have the semblance of novelty, although it is admitted that, there is 

 not the most distant chance of any man's succeeding. Unfortunately, how- 

 ever, in this determination to be^riginal, half the reasonings which were 

 used by the Catholic advocates in the late debate, were of a character so 

 barefacedly untenable as to absolutely throw discredit upon the question ; 



