"The forlorn hope of the Tory and Orange press went still further. They boldly disputed Ireland's right to the title of Catholic. So, although, ten years and twenty years before, these same journals furiously opposed the admission of religious denominations into the statistics of the census, yet, when the census of 1861 drew near, they quite as loudly demanded its insertion. They made it a matter of challenge to the Catholics.
"The ultramontane journals accepted the challenge. The Catholics unanimously demanded a denominational census. The results were submitted to the representatives of the nation in July, 1861. No shorter, more decisive, or more triumphant answer could have been given to the sarcasms and challenges of the old Protestant party."
We confine ourselves here to the total sums, leaving out minor details:
Catholics . . . . . . . . 4,490,583
Establishment . . . . . . 687,661
Dissenters . . . . . . . 595,577
Jews . . . . . . . . . . 322
Thus in this century, as throughout the whole of the century of gloom, the island is truly and really Catholic.
By way of contrast, a few words on the same subject may not be out of place with reference to England. We have already stated, and given some of the reasons for so doing, that, at the death of Elizabeth, England was already Protestant to the core.
In his "Memoirs," vol. ii., Sir John Dalrymple has published a curious official report of the numbers of Catholics in England, in the reign of William of Orange, found after his death in the iron chest of that vigilant monarch. From this authentic document we take the following extract:
Number of Freeholders in England.1 (1 Dr. Madden's "Penal Laws.")
Conformists. Papists. Non-Conformists.
Province of
Canterbury, 2,123,362 93,151 11,878
Province of
York, 353,892 15,525 1,978