No Catholic was permitted to marry a Protestant; and the priest assisting at such marriage was punished with death. No Catholic could be a guardian; and to the agonies of death this new pain was added: that the dying father foresaw that his children would be committed to Protestants, to be brought up in a religious faith which had been the unclean source of all the ills that had befallen him and his country. The law held out a bribe to Catholic children to induce them to betray their parents, and put a premium on apostasy.
This inhuman Code was not framed at one time, nor was there found in its enactments any system or unity of purpose, other than that which is derived from the hate of the persecutor for his victim. To this blind fury whatever helped to crush and degrade the Catholic people of Ireland seemed just.
Though it seems almost incredible, it is nevertheless certain, that the execution of these laws was worse than the laws themselves. The whole intent of the legislators being directed to the extermination or perversion of the Irish Catholics, the fullest license was granted to the caprice and cruelty of individuals. The Catholic had no protection. If he sought to defend himself, he was forced to employ a Protestant lawyer, who could bring his case only before a Protestant judge, who was obliged to submit it to a Protestant jury. In these circumstances recourse to the law was worse than useless. The great landed proprietors were accustomed to deal out justice with a high hand. They had prisons in their castles, into which, for or without cause, they threw their helpless
dependents; and whenever these outrageous proceedings were complained of, the grand juries threw out the indictments. To horsewhip or beat the poor Catholics was a frequent mode of correction, and they were even deliberately murdered without any fear of punishment. This we have upon the authority of Arthur Young, whose testimony is certainly above suspicion; and he adds that the violation of their wives and daughters was not considered an offence. If the great lord met them on the road, his servants were ordered to turn their wagons and carts into the ditch to make room for his carriage; and if the unfortunate wretches dared complain, they were answered with the lash. For a Catholic to bring suit against his Protestant persecutor would have been at once most absurd and most dangerous.
The religious fanaticism which had inspired the Penal Code lost its honesty and earnestness amid these frightful excesses. The tyrant is degraded with his victim, and crimes committed in the name of religion, if they begin in sincerity, end in hypocrisy. Even the poor honesty of blind zeal vanishes, and selfishness and hate alone remain. This is the sad spectacle which Ireland presents to our view after the first fury of persecution had spent itself. The dominant class grew indifferent to all religion, and, having ignominiously failed to make any impression on the faith of the Catholics, connived at their worship.
But as zeal grew cold, self-interest became more intense. So long as the Catholics remained in poverty and helplessness no notice was taken of them; but the moment they acquired anything which could excite the cupidity of a Protestant, the law was appealed to against
them. The priest, who, according to the Code, incurred the penalty of transportation or hanging for saying Mass, could violate this article with impunity, provided he possessed nothing which might serve as a motive for denouncing him. The laws against Catholic worship were kept upon the statute-book, chiefly because they served as an ever-ready and convenient pretext for robbing Catholics. Another end, too, scarcely less important, was thereby gained. The Catholics, even when left in peace, lived in continual fear, knowing that any chance spark would be sufficient to light the flames of persecution. In this way it was hoped that the martyr-spirit in them would give place to the spirit of the slave; and this hope was not altogether delusive. Since there was a kind of security in remaining in abject poverty, in lurking in secret places, in speaking only with bated breath, and in showing the most cringing servility in the presence of their masters, the Catholics came by degrees to look upon this servile condition as their normal state, and hardly dared even hope for a better. We may remark that this is another instance in which the Catholic Church is held responsible for the work of Protestants. Protestant England has enslaved Catholic Ireland; has for centuries put forth the most heartless and cunningly-devised efforts to extinguish in the Irish Catholics every noble and free aspiration of the human heart; and then she has turned round and appealed to the world, with the cant which is twin-born with hypocrisy, to bear witness that Ireland is in fetters because the Catholic Church is opposed to liberty; and the world, in whose eyes success is ever the highest and the best, has smiled approval.
Is it, then, possible that six hundred years of hereditary bondage, of outlawry, of want and oppression, should produce no evil effect upon the character of a people, however nobly endowed by God? Are we to expect industry when every motive that incites men to labor is absent? How can he who is forbidden to possess anything be provident? Or is it not natural that the hopelessly wretched should grow desperate, reckless of their deeds or their consequences?
Great misfortunes, like great successes, try men as nothing else can. In the lowest depths of misery we are apt to forget that there is a lower deep. For ourselves, the more we study the history of the Irish people, and compare their character with the wrongs which they have suffered, the more wonderful does it seem to us that they should have remained superior to fate. If they have not wholly escaped the evil influences of the worst of all tyrannies, nothing, at least, has been able to destroy their purity, their hopefulness, their trust in God, and belief in the final triumph of right. They are, in our eyes, the highest example of the supremacy of the soul, of the invincible power of faith; the most striking proof of a divine Providence that watches over the destiny of nations. It will not be thought out of place to quote here the words of a Protestant historian who, in his old age, seems to regret the impartiality and generous love of unpopular truth which characterized his earlier manhood.
“Such,” says Mr. Bancroft, “was the Ireland of the Irish—a conquered people, whom the victors delighted to trample upon and did not fear to provoke. Their industry within the kingdom was prohibited