CHAPTEE XVIII.—Something not very Pleasant for all Parties.
The position of England at this period was any thing but an easy one. The Rebellion of '45 had commenced, and the young Pretender had gained some signal victories. Independently of this, she was alarmed by the rumor of a French invasion on her southern coast. Apprehensive lest the Irish Catholics, galled and goaded as they were by the influence of the penal laws, and the dreadful persecution which they caused them to suffer, should flock to the standard of Prince Charles, himself a Catholic, she deemed it expedient, in due time, to relax a little, and accordingly she “checked her hand, and changed her pride.” Milder measures were soon resorted to, during this crisis, in order that by a more liberal administration of justice the resentment of the suffering Catholics might be conciliated, and their loyalty secured. This, however, was a proceeding less of justice than expediency, and resulted more from the actual and impending difficulties of England than from any sincere wish on her part to give civil and religious freedom to her Catholic subjects, or prosperity to the country in which, even then, their numbers largely predominated. Yet, singular to say, when the Rebellion first broke out, all the chapels in Dublin were closed, and the Administration, as if guided by some unintelligible infatuation, issued a proclamation, commanding the Catholic priesthood to depart from the city. Those who refused this senseless and impolitic edict were threatened with the utmost severity of the law. Harsh as that law was, the Catholics obeyed it; yet even this obedience did not satisfy the Protestant party, or rather that portion of them who were active agents in carrying out this imprudent and unjustifiable rigor at such a period. They were seized by a kind of panic, and imagined forsooth that a broken down and disarmed people might engage in a general massacre of the Irish Protestants. Whether this incomprehensible terror was real, is a matter of doubt and uncertainty; or whether it was assumed as a justification for assailing the Catholics in a general massacre, similar to that which they apprehended, or pretended to apprehend, is also a matter of question; yet certain it is, that a proposal to massacre them in cold blood was made in the Privy Council. “But,” says O'Connor, “the humanity of the members rejected this barbarous proposal, and crushed in its infancy a conspiracy hatched in Lurgan to extirpate the Catholics of that town and vicinity.”
In the meantime, so active was the persecuting spirit of such men as Whitecraft and Smellpriest that a great number of the unfortunate priests fled to the metropolis, where, in a large and populous city, they had a better chance of remaining incogniti than when living in the country, exposed and likely to be more marked by spies and informers. A very dreadful catastrophe took place about this time. A congregation of Catholic people had heard mass upon an old loft, which had for many years been decayed—in fact, actually rotten. Mass was over, and the priest was about to give them the parting benediction, when the floor went down with a terrific crash. The result was dreadful. The priest and a great many of the congregation were killed on the spot, and a vast number of them wounded and maimed for life. The Protestant inhabitants of Dublin sympathized deeply with the sufferers, whom they relieved and succored as far as in them lay, and, by their remonstrances, Government was shamed into a more human administration of the laws.
In order to satisfy our readers that we have not overdrawn our picture of what the Catholics suffered in those unhappy times, we shall give a quotation from the. Messrs. Chambers, of Edinburgh, themselves fair and liberal men, and as impartial as they are able and well informed:
“Since the pacification of Limerick, Ireland had been ruled exclusively by the Protestant party, who, under the influence of feelings arising from local and religious antipathies, had visited the Catholics with many severities. The oath which had excluded the Catholics from office had been followed, in 1698, by an Act of the Irish Parliament, commanding all Romish priests to leave the kingdom, under the penalty of transportation, a return from which was to be punishable by death. Another law decreed forfeiture of property and civil rights to all who should send their children abroad to be educated in the Catholic faith.” *
* “History and Present State of the British Empire.”
Edinburgh, W. and R. Chambers.
Can any reasonable person be in doubt for a moment that those laws were laws of extermination? In the meantime, let us hear the Messrs. Chambers further:
“After the death of William, who was much opposed to severities on account of religion, Acts of still greater rigor were passed for preventing the growth of Popery. Any child of a Roman Catholic who should declare himself a Protestant was entitled to become the heir of his estate, the father merely holding it for his lifetime, and having no command over it. Catholics were made incapable of succeeding to Protestants, and lands, passing over them, were to go to the next Protestant heir. Catholic parents were prevented from being guardians,to their own children; no Protestant possessing property was to be permitted to marry a Catholic; and Catholics were rendered incapable of purchasing landed property or enjoying long leases. These measures naturally rendered the Catholics discontented I subjects, and led to much turbulence. The common people of that persuasion, being denied all access to justice, took it into their own hands, and acquired all those lawless habits for which they have since been remarkable. Treachery, cruelty, and all the lower passions, were called into vigorous exercise. Even the Protestants, for their own sakes, were often obliged to connive at the evasion of laws so extremely severe, and which introduced much difficulty in their dealings with Catholics; but, when any Protestant wished to be revenged upon a Catholic, or to extort money from him, he found in these laws a ready instrument for his purpose. By an additional Act, in 1726, it was ordained that a Roman Catholic priest, marrying a Protestant to a Catholic, should suffer death; and in order that legal redress might be still less accessible to the Catholics, it was enacted, in 1728, that no one should be entitled to practise as an attorney who had not been two years a Protestant.”
This is a clear and succinct epitome of the penal laws; true, much more might be added; but it is enough to say that those who sow the wind will reap the whirlwind. It is not by placing restrictions upon creeds or ceremonies that religion can ever be checked, much less extinguished. Like the camomile plant, the more it is trampled on the more it will spread and grow; as the rude winds and the inclemency of the elements only harden and make more vigorous the constitutions of those who are exposed to them. In our state of the world, those who have the administration of political laws in their hands, if they ever read history, or can avail themselves of the experiences of ages, ought to know that it is not by severity or persecution that the affections of their fellow-subjects can be conciliated. We ourselves once knew a brutal ruffian, who was a dealer in fruit in the little town of Maynooth, and whose principle of correcting his children was to continue whipping the poor things until they were forced to laugh! A person was one day present when he commenced chastising one of them—a child of about seven—upon this barbarous principle. This individual was then young and strong, and something besides of a pugilist; but on witnessing the affecting efforts of the little fellow to do that which was not within the compass of any natural effort, he deliberately knocked the ruffian down, after having first remonstrated with him to no purpose. He arose, however, and attacked the other, but, thanks to a good arm and a quick eye, he prostrated him again, and again, and again; he then caught him by the throat, for he was already subdued, and squeezing his windpipe to some purpose, the fellow said, in a choking voice, “Are you going to kill me?”