was not sati fied with having exerted his utmost efforts to weaken and depress her, but he insulted her by drawing his apology for retiring from power from the very act of perfidy, by which he prevented that emancipation, by the prospect of which he duped her into the union. So barefaced was his duplicity throughout the whole negociation of that fatal measure, that whilst he and his agents were tempting the Catholics to give it support, in order to obtain their total emancipation, they were seducing the orangemen to exert their best energics to forward it, as the only effectual means of blasting the Catholics' hopes for ever. The Ministerial Agents even openly and from avowed authority assured the Orangemen, and the whole of the ascendancy party, that "by the union the Catholic question would be for ever set at rest: that its

agitation would never again interrupt the public repose, and that for any sacrifices Ireland might "make, the tranquillity founded on the extinction "of the Catholic claims would be a liberal and competent reward."

1801.

reasons of

Abdication.

It is singular, that out of the complicated Further variety of embarrassments, under which Mr. Pitt Mr. Pitt's found himself compelled to retire from the helm, the only transaction, which furnished him with a plausible or popular ground for resignation, was the Catholic question, which that crafty Minister and his followers have so frequently used as a most powerful engine for the worst of political purposes. Within very few days after the meeting of Parlia

ment, he made no

secret of his

secret of his resignation.

1801.

Other causes of

Ab

Great were the surprize and consternation, which
attended the report. Few indeed gave credit to
the alleged cause of the resignation: namely his
inability to carry the Catholic question, which
was imperiously necessary for the safety of the
state. He was too fond of power, his influence in
the country was too imposing, Ireland was too
insignificant to have caused such an important
change in all the departments of the state.
stracting from the merits and justice of the ques
tion, and from the expediency or necessity of its
being then propounded and carried, neither Mr.
Pitt's friends nor opponents could bring their
minds to believe, that an administration, which
had established itself in spite of the House of
Commons; which had baffled and at last subdued
a most formidable opposition; which had main-
tained itself upon new courtly principles for 17
years, and still commanded a decided majority in
the cabinet and senate, should have been thus
broken up
from the premier's inability to carry so
simple and just a measure, as that of an equal parti-
cipation of constitutional rights amongst all the
King's subject.

Besides those differences in the cabinet, to the Mr. Pitt's account of which Mr. Pitt's friends most anxi

resignation. ously laid the abdication, it was generally be

lieved, that some differences with the Duke of York, as commander in chief of his Majesty's forces, contained more of the real grounds for

that change in his Majesty's councils.* These differences were said to turn upon three points. The first related to a diversity of opinion upon certain military arrangements and operations. The second arose out of a real or long suspected exercise of unconstitutional influence in a high quarter, which counteracted and embarrassed the important duties of his Majesty's official and responsible advisers. As these two heads affected Ireland in common with the rest of the British Empire, attention is more particularly pointed to the third, which touched Ireland in particular and operated only upon the rest of the Empire by indirect consequence. His Royal Highness had taken deep offence at Mr. Pitt's open declarations of the imperious necessity of emancipating the Catholics of Ireland in which measure, should it ever take place, he and his adherents foresaw the sure extinction of the orange societies; and they universally looked up to the Duke of York as the peculiar patron of the Protestant ascendancy in Ireland, the support of which, each Orangeman individually swore constituted the condition and measure of his allegiance to the sovereign. Upon this as upon some other occasions very unfaithful representa

So notorious had these differences between the chief movers of the ostensible and secret cabinet become in the 2d week of January, that even the Government papers of that day spoke openly of their race on the Windsor Road immediately after their altercation, for the priority of telling the tale to his Majesty. Vid. their obligation in the introduction. Rules and regu lations &c. p. II.

1801.

1801. tions of those societies, and of the object of their institution were pressed upon the royal mind*.

How Mr. Pitt used his power.

For 17 years of the most awful period of human Governments, Mr. Pitt possessed more power, and used it more arbitrarily, than any Minister of a British Sovereign. He was supported in the strongest measures by the largest majorities ever known in Great Britain either in or out of Parliament. His policy and ambition had been eminently successful in weakening his opponents by division, and engrafting upon the fears, which he artfully excited in his dependents and his Sovereign, an infatuated conviction, that the maintaining of Whig principles constituted the worst of all crimes, Jacobinism, and the support of his measures became the exclusive test of loyalty and patriotism. Having thus discredited his political an

ments.

From the year 1797 the Orange Societies were so tenderly cherished and zealously promoted by the Duke of York, that almost every regiment, even of Militia in Ireland, received from the office of the Commander in Chief, encouragement, authority, or orders for establishing Orange Lodges in their respective regiThe person delegated for this mission was generally the Serjeant Major, or some other non-commissioned officer, signalized for his zeal against the Catholics. In some instances the institution of Orange Lodges under this high and official sanction has produced ferment and dissension, which compelled the commanding officer to investigate and punish both those, who gave rise to, and those, who perpetrated the consequent outrages. When often to the astonishment of the corps, and in defiance of military discipline and subordination, the conduct of the Serjeant has been justified by the production of the official document or warrant, most irregularly superseding that immediate authority, upon which alone the subordination and union of a regiment depend.

tagonists with the Sovereign, and the majority of an affrighted people, and setting at nought the powers of their now dwindled phalanx, he chose the embarrassing moment of public difficulty and dismay to resign the reins, when he wanted resolution to drive down the precipice, and had too much pride and too little experience to retrace the old or gain a new track. His craft impelled him to the subdolous expedient of making his stand upon the only principle* of liberal policy, which he had ever publicly avowed, and this he did for the purpose of deception. He was fully aware, that if the question arising out of it, had ever proceeded to discussion, he would have been warmly supported in it by Mr. Fox and his adherents, and at the same time, not opposed by any of his own dependants, except such (and too many they were) as professedly renounced the right and duties of independent judgment.

1801.

Parliament.

No ordinary cause prevented his Majesty from Meeting of attending the Imperial Parliament on the day of meeting. Whether the Speech from the Throne were on that awful occasion deferred on account of the indisposition of the Monarch, or the dis

❤ Mr. Pitt was ensnared by some of his parliamentary supporters into a pledge to abolish the slave trade; a measure always supported by Mr. Fox. As Mr. Pitt's power and influence for 17 years enabled him to ride with ease over the parliamentary course on every Government question, it is evidence of his insincerity to his pledge, that no effectual step was taken during his life to forward that liberal object. It was effected by his colleague and successor Lord Grenville.