XL.

of the people. The amelioration of their state by CHAP. universal suffrage and equality of rights was less intelligible to the peasantry than an exemption from tythe, of which they were assured in case of revo lution. To rouse by terror and resentment the numerous catholics into a preparation for hostility, which the chiefs of the union might hope to turn in due time to their own purposes, dreadful accounts were invented, and industriously propagated concerning the views of the Orange association, the members of which were asserted to have entered into engagements to wade knee-deep, or even, if opportunity should be given, to ride saddle-deep, in the blood of catholics. To impress the idea of this horrible falsehood, fabricated oaths of Orange-men were printed and dispersed. Reports from time to time were circulated of intended nocturnal massacres of catholics by troops of protestants; in consequence of which the people of some districts, abandoning their houses in the evening, lay concealed during night in the fields.

of Orange

Some pains were taken to refute such calumnies Declaration by the Orange association. This protestant confe- men. deracy had spread from the county of Armagh through other parts of the north, and into Leinster in 1797, particularly the metropolis, where it was generally adopted in the following year. Men of considerable rank had become members. These in a printed publication declared the object of the institution to be the preservation of public order,

and

CHAP. and of the existing system of government, and the

XLI.

Pastoral letter of

Hussey.

protection of all persons who behaved with loyalty, without any regard to differences of religion. They made the most solemn protestation that to injure any person on account of his religious opinions never entered their hearts. I firmly believe that their declaration was true, and that the improved system, as it then stood, and afterwards continued, was purely defensive. But from the outrages of the original Orange-men in the north, the behaviour of the vulgar sort elsewhere, and the deceptions practised by the propagators of disaffection, these pacific protestations gained not the least credit with the lower classes of catholics.

The bigotry of the catholics was sanctioned and 1797. encouraged by the publication of a pastoral letter to the clergy of his diocese from Doctor Hussey, Romish bishop of Waterford. In this the protestants were treated with great insolence, as a contemptible sect, which must soon have an end. He charged them with practices, of which they were and are quite innocent; and exhorted the Romish clergy to interdict, under pain of excom, munication, the children of their parishioners from mixing with protestants in places of education. As the religious instruction of children of the different sects at all protestant schools had been as completely distinct as if they had been taught in distinct seminaries, this prohibition was useless for its ostensible end, and must have had a more momentous

XLI.

mentous aim. The immediate effect was an aug- CHAP. mented display of religious prejudice among the Romanists, the withdrawing of their children from protestant schools to avoid the contamination of heresy, and a general separation of the two sects. The clergy of this communion appear to have acted, at least since that time, unremittingly on a plan, by which they might hope for the ultimate attainment of the exclusive establishment of their system of worship in this island. From the letters of Edmund Burke to Doctor Hussey on this occasion, two of which are given in Mr. Plowden's historical view of Ireland, the ardent wish of that orator for the establishment of the Roman catholic religion in this country is evident, with his exhortation to its prelates to be firmly united in its support against the protestant administration.

ings.

The parliament, which had assembled this year Parliamentaon the sixth of January, was, after several sittingsty proceedand adjournments, prorogued on the third of July, 1797. and dissolved by proclamation on the eleventh. On the nineteenth of April a secret committee of the commons was ordered to examine the papers of United Irishmen, of whom two committees had been arrested in Belfast. The report of this examination was made to the house on the tenth of May, and ordered to be published for the undeceiving of those members, of the Irish union, who, though really loyal, had been seduced into the

confederacy

XL1.

CHAP. Confederacy by the idea of its ultimate object being a parliamentary reform. A motion for a temperate reform, including a political equalization of catholics with protestants, was made on the fifteenth of the same month by William Brabazon Ponsonby, which was negatived by a majority of nearly six to one. Concession in these two points was recommended by the minority, as a measure efficacious for the overthrow of the Irish union, since the two subjects of discontent would thus be removed by which the conductors of that system had been enabled to work so successfully on the minds of the people. Henry Grattan, despairing of any success in his efforts, determined on a total secession from parliament, and ended his speech in the following words. "We have offered you our measure: you will reject it. We deprecate yours? you will persevere. Having no hopes left to persuade or dissuade, and having discharged our duty, we shall trouble you no more, and after this day shall not attend the house of com

Attempts.

mons."

Attempts had been made elsewhere against the system of coercion. Sheriffs and other legal officers had been requested to hold assemblies of the people in counties, towns, and districts, that addresses to the king might be prepared for the removal of his present ministers from his councils for The meetings were prevented by the refusal of the officers, or by threats of military violence, or, where the inhabitants actually assembled, were dispersed

ever.

XLI.

dispersed by the army. The plotters of democratic CHA P. revolution and political separation secretly rejoiced at the growing discontents, when men of more loyal sentiments were heard to declare, that" the minister who determines to enslave the people, must renounce his project, or wade through their blood."

CHAP.