"We must not overlook the fact that the Irish emigration to England and Scotland produces in many individual cases results which cannot be too deeply deplored.
"But there, also, as well as in America and Australia, through the economy of an admirable providence, God makes use of those Irish immigrants for the propagation and extension of the Catholic faith in the midst of English and Scotch Protestantism. What progress has not the Catholic religion made within the last thirty years in England? And might not the Catholics say to their separated brethren what Tertullian said to the Caesars of the third century: 'Our religion is but of yesterday; and behold, we fill your towns, your councils, your camps, your tribes, your decuriae, the palace, the senate, the forum . . . . You have persecuted us during centuries, and behold, we spring up afresh from the blood of martyrs!'
"At the beginning of the reign of George III., England and Scotland scarcely contained sixty thousand Catholics who had remained true to the faith of their fathers. Their number in 1821 was, according to the official census, five hundred thousand. In 1842, they were estimated at from two million to two million five hundred thousand. At present (1864) they number nearly four million, and of this total amount the single city of London figures for more than two hundred and fifty thousand."
In a note he adds the following figures, furnished him by Dr.
Grant, the late Bishop of Southwark:
Total No. of Catholics. No. of Irish.
Manchester . . . . . . . . . . . 80,000 . . . . . . 60,000
Liverpool . . . . . . . . . . 130,000 . . . . . . 85,000
Birmingham . . . . . . . . . . . 30,000 . . . . . . 20,000
Preston . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24,000 . . . . . . 4,300
Wigan . . . . . . . . . . . 18,000 . . . . . . 6,000
Bolton . . . . . . . . . . . 12,000 . . . . . . 4,000
St. Helen's (Lancashire) . . . . 10,000 . . . . . . 6,000
Edinburgh . . . . . . . . . . . 50,000 . . . . . . 35,000
Glasgow . . . . . . . . . . 127,000 . . . . . . 90,000
"Finally, we must not forget that about one-half the army and navy is composed of Irish Catholics.
"In 1792 England and Wales counted no more than thirty-five chapels; in 1840 the number amounted to five hundred, among which were vast and splendid churches, such as St. George's, Southwark, and the Birmingham Cathedral. At present (1864) the number is nearly one thousand.
"In connection with the movement of individual conversions, which yearly brings within our ranks from those of Protestantism the most upright, the sincerest, the best-disposed souls, the Irish immigration in England is then destined to play an important part in the so desirable return of that great island to the faith which she received in the sixth century from St. Gregory the Great and St. Austin of Canterbury," and, let us add, from Aidan and his Irish monks of Lindisfarne and Iona, as Montalembert has shown.
If we examine closely the figures just furnished by F. Perraud, and consider that the number of Catholics in Great Britain was only five hundred thousand in 1821, which, following his calculation, mounted to four million in 1864, if we look closely into the gradations of the increase marked in the various censuses taken between those dates, we shall find that the Irish immigration has indeed played a most important part in the return of England toward Catholicity. We are surprised to find that he seems to estimate the number of Irish in England at only one million; there can be no doubt that they and their offspring compose the majority of Catholics there, and that many of the Englishmen who come back to the true faith are induced by their example and influence, particularly among the lower orders, and that the real work of the conversion of the English nation rests in the hands of the Irish immigrants. Mr. Mayhew has informed us of the disposition of the English costermongers on religious matters.
We have now examined the three great waves which bore the Irish to foreign countries; the lesser streamlets, which wandered away into other English colonies, may be dismissed, as to trace and follow up their course would involve more time and trouble than they really call for. We now see the Irish race disseminated in large groups over many and vast territories; and, although the home population has been considerably diminished by that great exodus, and is now reduced to about five millions, nevertheless, to count them as they are dispersed throughout the world, their number is far higher than it has ever been before; and we now proceed to offer some considerations tending to show the effects of that vast emigration on the resurrection of the race, and on the future progress of the country from which the race comes.