1 ENGLAND AND — IRELAND A LECTURE BV THE — Rev. a. J. BRAY For Gratuitous Distribution. MONTREAL 1880. ^ ^^- ^<^^ NORDHEIMER»S HALL, FRIDAY, 17th DEC'R., 1880. -» *m m I ENGLAND AND IRELAND. ■ #•» I A LKCTURK BY THK REV. A. J.. BRAY*^ -*o«- REMARKS OF DR. KINGSTON, THE CHAIRMAN. Ladies and Gentlemen. — Having been honored with the request that I should occupy the Chair this evening, on the occasion of a lecture to be delivered by the Rev. Mr. Bray, I do so, with great pleasure. It is usual, I believe, for a Chairman to foreshadow, some- what, the ground to be traversed by the lecturer, — to allude briefly to the obstacles in the way, the difficulties to be encountered, and the dangers to be avoided ; but as the lecturer this evening, has not given me a peep into his manuscript, I cannot tell what obstacles he may have to meet with, and 1 cannot, therefore, say how they should be put aside and overcome. But this I know, — judging from the lecturer's past reputation, — that if soil is to be upturned it will be soil prolific with kindness ; if obstacles are to be put aside, they will be put aside man- fully ; if there are rocks in the way, — rocks of human prejudice, —he will batter them to pieces ; and if streams are met with, or even the channel itself, he will throw an arch over it, — an arch of peace. With these remarks I beg to introduce to you the Rev. Mr. Bray, with all his imperfections thick upon him. ^Applause.) THE LECTURE. Mr. Bray was greeted with loud cheering. He said : — Mr. Chairman, Ladies and Gentlemen: — I beg you to believe that I felt it, — and I feel it still,— to be no small honor to be requested to give my lecture a second time, in this city. I suppose such a compliment is not often paid to many men, and it is gratifying to me that my lecture has been considered of some importance, that it is thought that some good is to be got out of it ; for it must have been so considered, or this demand would not have been made upon me. I must say, however, that I thought that more Englishmen and Scotchmen as well as Irishmen would have taken a lively interest in this matter. For, truth to tell, I had more thought of the English than of the Irish when I first thought to give the lecture I knew that the Irish had no need of having their attention drawn to the wrongs heaped upon their country ; I knew that they required no information on this point ; but I wanted English and Scotch people to know the sufferings of the Irish ; I wanted them to see the scars on the mutilated body of poor Ireland, and I wanted to show them how these scars were got. I wanted them to know the cause of this periodical outburst of discontent in Ireland. They were saying, we were saying, — all of us, — what is the matter with Ireland ? What is the cause of this discontent? Is it because there is some peculiarity in Celtic blood, that renders it necessary that these people should fight every now and then ? Is this discontent merely a periodical outbreak of unreason? Is this discontent in Ireland a thing to be battered into silence by the policeman's club, or silenced by threats of buckshot ? Is it a thing to be driven into hiding by brutal force ? Or is there some real reason, pal- pable and sound, for the complaints made in Ireland? I made an effort to answer these questions, I know the English people to be a just people ; I know that the vast majority of the English people are desirous of righting the wrongs done by their ancestors ; and that many of them are not unwilling to enact better land laws in Ireland ; and I want to strengthen the hands of Gladstone and Bright. I want to put in a plea for justice in this matter. I want to bring Englishmen and Irishmen together to talk this matter over, and to understand this matter, so as to find justice the one for the other. (Applause.) If we understand this matter mutually, if we discuss it together calmly and reasonably, we shall, by and bye, find some method of promoting the cause of right. So, — I told the story, with extreme carefulness, with truth- fulness, and with an honest effort to be fair. I have been since compli- mented for this. I have been complimented on the bravery of doing it. 8 1 was not conscious of any kind of courage whatever. It never oc- curred to me that I was doing anything brave. I like always to tell the truth, and shame the devil ; and because I am an English- man, I can afford to tell the truth about this matter ; I can afford to criticise my country ; I can find fault with any wrong she has com- mitted. She has not always been what she is now ; and I hope to find her better to-morrow than she is to-day. (Applause.) I am, myself, of the grand old Celtic race. ]Jorn among the wild, weird scenes of Cornwall, with my first consciousness that of wandering over its dark brown sand, and of climbing its surf-beaten rocks,- -I derive, from those rocks of my own home, a natural sense of truthfulness. Let me now turn to the history of Ireland. Of Pagan Ireland we have no authentic records. At the introduction of the Christian religion the island was in possession of the Milesians, and was divided into the five kingdoms, Ulster, Munster, Leinster, Connaught, and Meath ; the dominant king or real monarch of all Ireland being called the Arda Righ, or High King. The kingdoms were again subdivided into small principal- ities, the several districts being inhabited by distinct Septs, each district the common property of the entire Sept, and the dis- tribution of the land being so ordered that each one had a right to so much land to live LUBY'S FOR THE HAIR Is A Most Delightful Toilet Dressing. upon, somewhere. The land tenure was regulated by the Brehon laws ; it was not feudalism, as in England and Scotland ; it was nothing akin to feudalism ; there had never been feudalism in Ireland. Christian- ity shed a light over the land j and from it to other lands. Religion was just suited to the Irish nature, and was received by them with a burst of enthusiasm. It warmed their generous hearts, and fired their poetic fancy. But Ireland adopted the Eastern Greek Church, and not the Western Roman Church. St. Patrick may have been there. I do not say he was not ; but it is extremely doubtful. You can believe that he was, if you like ; but whether he came there or not, the Danes did, in the ninth century. Then, in the twelfth century, came Henry, the second English King of that name, armed with a Bull granted by Pope Adrian, for the conquest of Ireland, and its due subjection to the Church of Rome. But his efforts were/ew and feeble to establish English authority, and had Irishmen been true to Ireland, they would have shaken off the EngHsh at once. Dermet McMurrogh, King of Leinster, having been worsted in internal feuds and wars with the other princes, sought and obtained from Henry the Second, the aid of the English. Some English and Welsh went over, headed by Strongbow and Fizi- simmons, with whose assistance McMurrogh was enabled to overcome his adversaries. This gave a footing in Ireland to the English, who formed themselves into the notorious P^nglish " Pale." Two blunders were committed,— one, by the English,— that they did not entirely concjuer Ireland ; — and a second blunder, by the Irish,— that they did not drive the English into the sea. (Cheers.) A decision then and there would have been best for both, for all time. .Vs I have said, Henry the Second made a feeble attempt to enfoice English law and rule in Ireland. He received the questionable submission of some of the chiefs. But it was not until the reign of Henry the Eighth that English rule in Ireland became anything like general. Then, for the first time, did the Irish feel the hand of a master ; but it was the hand of one who wanted to rule by law and who wanted to civilize the people. He had a mind to rule in Ireland as in England, and Thomas Crom- well undertook to execute his will. The P^arl of Kildare thought to frighten him, but, being summoned to England, was sent to the Tower. Excited by a false report of his father's death, Kildare's son, the young Lord Thomas Fitzgerald, liew to arms. For a short time he met with success ; the Arch- bishop of Dublin was mur- dered, and other excesses were LUBY'S Strengthens Weak Hair and checks its falling out. ^^-. committed ; but this revolt followed the fashion of other Irish revolts. Fitzgerald was chased into the fastnesses of Connaught and Munster, and ultimately taken and beheaded. Sir William Skeffington battered down castles, and trampled the Celtic tribes into utter sub- jection. Henry was disposed to rule Ireland by law ; but he knew only English law. It has been a failing characteristic of EngHshmen that they cannot think of anything but what is English ; they never take into account that other people have their laws and customs and insti- tutions. Henry never took the trouble to consider that the Irish had a patriotic and rich literature. What cared Henry and his ministers that the Irish were a people of settled ways ? What cared they for the system of common tenure of land by the tribes ? They had conquered Ireland, and they thought to make it English in manners laws and language. A huge blunder, and the mother of untold miseries ! They little imagined how unmixable was Celtic blood, and how undying was Celtic patriotism. The best plan was thought to be the colonization of the country by English settlers, but Henry's method was to make the chiefs English, and so work down from them to the masses. The Irish chiff: were made English vassals and (taking no notice of the fact that by Irish custom, and by the Brehon laws, the land belonged to the tribe at large and not to individuals), — the English law-courts regarded the chiefs as sole [)roi)rietors, and gave them a title to the land. Religion had as yet undergone no real change. The Church without the " Pale " was the same as the Church within the " Pale," as to doctrine and discipline. When Henry had broken with Rome, the Irish chieftains accepted the new headship without a mur- mer ; but when his ecclesiastics were bringing about a change in reli- gious doctrines, the Irish said : '' No. Deal with names and forms as you will ; but when you come to lay rough hands on our faith, we re- .siST." And they did resist. And in resisting they found that as Irish- men they had a common cause. In fine, they were, at once, a people ; they clasped hands together over a grave in which they buried centuries of feud. Those within the " Pale " became one with those without the " Pale." A nation was born of that religious union : and that nation was Ireland. (Loud and enthusiastic cheering.) But it was a child of the storm, — destined to be tossed and rent by many winds. Mary took the throne, and tried to thrust the shadow back on the dial. The Dublin government reverted to the old idea of colo- nization. Two pieces of territory were, with that view, at once parcelled out and named King's County and Queen's County in honor of Philip and Mary. The Irish as a people seem- ed doomed to extermination. To whom could they look ? Religious foes came and took away their faith ; religious friends came and took away their lands. The Irish lost all land in Munster,— some four million acres, and it was given to Englishmen. The Irish could only remain as tenants to the new proprietors, at high rents, or as day-laborers on the soil. A few were able to evade the law by submitting to high rents, and rack rents ; and some retired to the mountains. By a decision of the King's Bench, in the reign of James the First, the whole system of gavelkind was de- clared illegal, which meant that the proprietory rights of the natives were completely swept away. Then came the colonization of Ulster. Six counties were settled with English and Scotch. A large Presby- terian element was introduced ; these were full of hatred towards their Irish neighbors, and took no pains to hide their hate. But the Irish were docile ; and had they found that the English were disposed to act justly then, they would have been peaceable. Notwithstanding the confiscations in these provinces, the abolition of their land customs. LU BY'S ■ - ; V ' } Keeps the Head Clean, Cool and free from Dandr uff. ; . -- - ;;. LUBY'S 6 and the general planting on their soil of a race whose every act was cruelty, still they would have borne it ; but this was not all. The English had an unquenchable thirst for Irish lands. All in possession of lands were ordered to produce written titles to commissioners appointed by the King, Many of these titles, on account of the disturbed state of the times for centuries back, shew- ed defects ; and, in the place of the actual possessors, the English stepped in, under this game of confiscation, supported by legal quibbles, as fine spun as it is possible to conceive. Charles the First,— half a fool, (laughter), but perfectly harmless, if he had not been King of Pbgland, — was obstinate and unjust. He made promises and broke them, he granted rights to landlords and took them from them, by legal confiscation. Wentworth wanted for the king absolute despotism in Ireland, as well as in Great Britain, and he inflicted new cruelties on the Irish people. The Puritan party was fast rising to power, inspired by a hatred of Popery. The Scotch Covenanters had risen in arms solemnly pledged to extirpate Popery and Prelacy. When the king was asked to confiscate two- thirds of the lands of all Catho- lics ; when Priests were hanged Restores Cray Hair to its j in Ireland for celebrating Mass ; when the sword was drawn for the extirpation of Popery in Ireland, the Irish believed that the time for fighting had come. From Elizabeth to the confisca- tions under Charles, the work of spoilation had been going on. It seemed at last as if the troubles in England had given Ireland a chance. They took the chance ; and rose in rebellion. Briefly, I will tell it. The ruthless policy of confiscation had been pushed with vigor. In Ulster the agrarian grievance had caused several risings : but Munster and Connaught had remained loyal, and would have remained loyal, had not the heads of the Irish Government, in 1641, prorogued the Irish Parliament, so as to thwart the passage of bills signed by the King, providing for the annulment of certain sequestrations of land, and confirming the Irish possessors in their possession of them. At the same time it had been declared that the Roman Catholic religion was to be rooted out. The Irish of Ulster rose in mad revolt against their oppressors. Early in December, 1641, all Ireland was in a blaze. I hate war with every fibre of my being. I have a horror of its horrors. I think of the waste and woe it makes. But there is something I hate tar more than war, — I hate the ruthless oppression of men, the spoiling of their property, the shameless robbing of men of their rights. The Natural Color. poor rrish were goaded to revolt. It was an awfu! thing for these Irish people to spoil and kill and ravage. Yes, it was an awful thing. But, then, this is not the first part of the piece I am giving you now. This is the second act, which connes in as quite a natural consequence of the first. They were being hemmed in ; the enemy was closing in upon them. The very hell-hounds were at their heels. What then shall they do? Shall they turn, as men, and fight for their rights? Or, shall they submit like sheep to be worried to death by wild dogs ? Like men they fought for their rights, (Cheers,) Under some circumstances revolt is glory ; under some circumstances submission is a crime. (Loud applause.) It may be, — I cannot tell, — that if I had lived in those days, an Englishman, I might have made a clutch at the property of the Irisn ; but I am sure that if, on the other hand I had lived, in those days, an Irishman, I should have risen in revolt, — mad as the maddest at the multitude of the wrongs imposed upon my country. (Loud and continued cheering.) Popular history, — and I believe it has very general credence, — asserts that this Ulster rebellion was a general massacre of Protestants, resembling that of the Danes by the English, under Ethel- red, and of the Huguenots, by the Catholics, on St. Barthol- omew's day. Clarendon in his history asserts that, in this Ul- ster rebellion, 40,000 or 50,000 Protestants were slain before they had any suspicion of being in danger, or before they could provide for their defence. It has ever been said by others that 150,000, or 200,000, to 300,000, so perished at the hands of the rebels. For many years I believed in the truth of this, and I have justified the work of Cromwell on that ground. Having thought over this matter, I sought out the truth from other sources, — not Irish, — and I got the means of forming an unbiased judgment. As the result of my search I have no hesitation, — and I am ready to stake my reputation on it, as a lecturer, and as a man trying to understand history, — that while there was, here and there, some cruel work, as is always the case in a great popular rising, there was no general organized massacre or planned conspiracy such as that which took place at the Sicilian Vespers, or at the massacre of the Huguenots, on St. Bartholomew's day. That all such reports are utterly untrue I could quote to you abundance of proof These Irishmen were not mild. I cannot say that they got up one morning, and gave the English notice to quit, and lent them their jewels, as in the case of the Israelites and the Egyptians. The L U B Y ' S 1 Gives a Beautiful Gloss and Perfume to the Hair i 1 ■ 8 English were driven from their habitations, and their expulsion was cer- tainly accompanied by some barbarities ; Scotchmen were at first left unmolested, partly because they feared to attack them, and partly because they hoped to have them as allies. All food and shelter was denied to the English, and in multitudes they perished. We find O'Reilly sending a convoy with some of them to Dublin ; we find that when castles surrendered, the terms of capitulation were nearly always kept ; and this took place in Ulster, where these horrible massacres are suppposed to have been committed. The main character of the rebel- lion was not murder, but plunder ; and the chief object was to expel the English from the houses and lands occupied by them. I have read despatches from Ireland to England, all speaking of plunder, but not one of murder. Atrocities were committed, no doubt. It was an un- disciplined rising of men, whom years of cruel hardship had maddened, and of course you must expect ferocity in such men. They ivere fero- cious. The persecuted had turned upon their persecutors ; the tiger was chasing the hunters ; and that is always mad work. Eighty per- sons were flung into the river LU B Y*S As a Toilet Dressing for Ladies' or Gentlemen's Hair Has no equal. from the bridge at Portadown. Men, and women, and children, who had shut themselves up in houses were burnt to ashes : men were hanged, and women and children, expelled from their houses, were starved to death, and died from exposure. I need not dwell on the story. These deeds were met, as we shall see, by terrible reprisals. I will not dwell on the war now prosecuted with vigor and considerable success, by the confederacy of Anglo-Irish Catholics, called into existence by this Ulster revolt ; nor will I stop to detail the events of the truce which followed, in 1643, '"^^^ the events of 1646, 1648, or 1649, which completed the reconciliation between the English Parliamentarians and Royalists, and the establishment of the Commonwealth. At length Cromwell swooped down upon the poor doom- ed Irish, beating down royalist and peasant alike. Nothing can atone for the atrocities he committed and permitted. There is no blacker record in history than that of the acts of Cromwell, in Ireland. He won and deserved the eternal hatred of all Irishmen ; and until I came to Canada I never met with a single Englishmen who could say a word in palliation of the barbarities he practised in Ireland. If I had to speak of Cromwell and England, I could extol him ; I am proud of the grand stand he made for English liberty ; he broke the back of tyranny, and by sword and gun he settled the fact that the only divine right 9 kings have to rule, is to rule justly. He laid the foundation of English freedom, and made it utterly impossible for a tyrant to sit on the En- glish throne for evermore. But of Cromwell in Ireland, I 3ay that I am ashamed. His work in Ireland was a series of horrible, merciless massacres. He began by storming Drogheda ; soldiers surrendered, and many of them were butchered ; officers were knocked on the head ; men and women were put to the sword, and those who survived the slaughter were shipped as slaves to Barbadoes. It is horrible to read the storming of Drogheda, where three thousand men, women and children were cruelly murdered. Cromwell overran Ireland, and being called back to England, he left Ireton to complete his terrible work of destruction. Six hundred and sixteen thousand people are said to have perished by the sword, famine, and the plague. A great number were sold to the slave dealers. Hundreds of boys and girls were sent to Barbadoes, and sold to the planters. The Catholic religion was absolutely suppressed; and the priest who went, disguised, in the courage of his faith, could give consolation to a dying man only at the peril of ~~ ~ his life. Then came the Crom- The Imp Dyspepsia wellian settlement, the cause of all the political and social trouble which wastes Ireland and vexes England to-day. All the land in the three largest and richest provinces was confiscated, and divided amongst adventurers and Puritan soldiers, whose pay was in arrear. On the twelfth August, 1652, this Act of Settlement was passed. All persons, including eccle- siastics, concerned in the 1641 rebellion, forfeited life and land. All who had accepted commissions under the King, were condemned to banish- ment, and forfeited two-thirds of their estates, the other one-third being assigned to their wives and children. All Catholics, who (though they had not been in arms against the Parliament), had not been in the Puritan army, or proved their constant good affection for the common- wealth, were to forfeit one-third of their estates, and to receive lands west of the Shannon, equal to the value of the other two-thirds. That was simply as complete a policy of plunder as could be formulated. There was some charity vouchsafed to those whose estates or goods did not amount to ten pounds. It wasn't worth the trouble of collect- ing. They were to have a free pardon, but only on condition of trans- porting themselves across the Shannon. This river nearly severs the five counties of the Province of Connaught together with Clare County Irom the rest of the kingdom ; and these six Counties were set apart,. CEASES TO TORMENT THOSE WHO USE MILK OF MAGNESIA A MILDi PLEASANTi and EFFECTIVE REMEDY FOR Nausea, Headache, Furred Tongue, Bitter Mouth and Bad Breath. 10 for the settlement and confinement of the Irish, whose estates were so confiscated. To divide Ulster, Munster, and Leinster amongst the Protestants, colonization commissioners were appointed, who gave the despoiled Irish until the first of May, 1654, to transport themselves, under pain of outlawry, into their new homes across the Shannon, and, when there, they were not to appear within two miles of the Shannon border, or within four miles of the sea board. Every meeting, of four or more persons, jiot of one family, was declared treasonable ; to have arms was a capital offence ; any transport found on the left bank of the Shannon could be legally shot by any person. All Catholic clergymen were ordered to quit the country on pain of death. It was a capital offence to celebrate Mass or perform any of the ceremonies of the Romish Church. To harbor a priest was treason. To be absent from church for one Sunday was to incur a fine of half a crown. We should have good collections, if such a state of things prevailed here as existed there in those days. The magistrates were authorized to send around and tender the oath of abjuration of the Catholic Faith ; and a refusal subjected the party to im" prisonment. Cromwell did most mighty things for England ; but he does, indeed, deserve the eternal hatred of Ireland. Under Cromwell's rule, five million acres of the best land of the Island were confiscated > and this went to the soldiers and adventurers of his army. Penned up between the mile line of the Shannon on one side, and the four mile line of the sea on the other, the poor Irish passed seven years of a bondage, whose severity has never been equalled by anything in the annals of Christendom. The Irish heart beat high with hope on the accession of Charles the Second. They relied on the Royal declaration of Breda, sent by Charles before the restoration, for just satisfaction in respect of their forfeited estates. But there was a practical difficulty in the way. The land had passed into the possession of the EngHsh settlers, who had acquired a right to it from the English Parliament. The Irish might easily overlook all this. A wrong was more easily done than undone. The Catholics proposed an indemnity to be given to satisfy those ad- venturers who had valid claims, and that a Parliament should be called to Dublin to raise a revenue ; but English ideas opposed all this. The proposal was rejected ; and Charles, by his declaration of settlement, confirmed the adventurers and soldiers in the possession of all lands allotted to them for advances of money or arrears of pay ; and provided The Great Antidote for Worms in Children OR AduLts is DEVINS' WORM PASTILLES, Being always of Uniform Strength, and are Approved and Highly Recommended BY the Medical Profession. 11 that officers who had served in the royal army before June, 1649, ^^^ who had not received lands, should receive them at the rate of a little more than half the amount due to them. Protestants whose estates had been handed over to adventurers were restored, and the adventurers compensated. Innocent Papists were to be restored, and the persons possessing their land reprised ; but no Papist was to be restored to land within a corporate town ; for it was considered necessary to keep all corporations in Protestant hands ; those persons were to be reprised by lands in the neighborhood. Then came measures for those concerned in the rebellion, and the peace of 1648 ; and who had submitted to the Cromwellian arrangement. If they had accepted lands in Connaught, they were to be held to their bargain. Those who had served under His Majesty were to be restored to their estates. Only about thirty per cent, were able to avail themselves of this special act of grace j for the restitu- tion of these estates was subject to those in possession being first reprised, and the commissioners for executing the declaration were men bound by interest and inclination to the adventurers and soldiers. If I had been offer- ing criticism instead of an his- torical outline, I should say, we should not be too hasty or too severe in condemning the Eng- lish government. The King and his ministers were not free to follow a certain course ac- cording to their bent of mind, whatever that bent professed to be. Le- gislation had difficulties. Charles the Second meant more or less to make an honest effort to benefit Ireland ; but he could not control the ovenvhelming majority in the Commons that discountenanced Popery. The Catholics had no influence there. Then there was this difficulty : there was not sufficient available land to satisfy all. As the Duke of Ormond said, — *' if the adventurers and soldiers must be satisfied to the extent of what is supposed to be intended by the declaration, and if all the land taken from the Papists is to be restored to them, then there must be new discoveries, — a ,new Ireland, — for the o/J will not serve to satisfy these demands.'' It was therefore necessary to deter- mine which party must suffer. If the area of Ireland could have been increased, I don't mean to say that the adventurers would have been satisfied ; but a problem would have been solved. Charles could not right it ; and the Protestants had no desire to right it. They were in actual possession ; and possession, the lawyers say, is nine points of law. The Irish dispossessed of their land became poorer and more miser- able. It is always easy to discredit a poor friendless people. The rumours of plots and crimes invented by the adventurers, and spread by their paid agents in England, with the people in England A Safe and Certain Cure for Worms in Children and Adults is DEVINS' WORM PASTILLES, They are a Delicious Confection, and AS A Remedy, most wonderful ; IN their effect. 12 ready to believe them, rendered the cause of the Irish very unfortunate, and turned English public opinion dead against them ; and they quar- relled with the only man who could have helped them, the Duke of Ormond. No wonder that Charles sided with public opinion. He had intended to give them their just rights under the peace of 1648 ; but he considered that the settlement of Ireland was rather an affair of policy than of justice ; and he thought the loss, which must fall somewhere, should fall on the Irish. The Irish were satisfied that a modification should be made, and the articles of peace of 1648, so favorable to the Irish, were abandoned. A court was established to try the claims of in- nocent Papists. Four thousand innocents came ; but only about six hundred were heard ; and the proportion of innocents was so great that the Cromwellians feared that their plunder was about to be wrested from them. There was a threat of a great insurrection in Ireland. The commissioners were recalled, thus leaving more than three thousand claims unheard ; so that about that number of ancient and respectable Irish families were thus stripped of their property without even the form of a trial, without receiving the privilege not refused to the meanest criminal, that of being heard in their own defence. Subsequently, however, Orm- ond was allowed to nominate twenty of the Irish to be restored, as a special favor ; but all other Catholics, whose claims, for want of time of the commis- sioners, had not been investigated, were treated as disqualified. The net result was that, whereas, previous to 1641, the Irish owned two-thirds of the entire land of Ireland, the Protestants now owned two-thirds. This was a settlement ; it was a settlement with a ven- geance for the poor Irish ; and yet the years that followed were favored with peace and prosperity. But Ireland was doomed. Charles died ; and James his brother, the Duke of York, reigned instead. James was the least wise of all English monarchs. A man of less than mediocre ability, a bigoted Catholic, his feeble mind would contain only one idea at one time, and that was the establishment of Catholicity as the dominant faith. He increased the army, and gave commissions in the army to Cadiolics. Still he hel€ the i)eople loyal even in the Monmouth rebellion ; but when he endeavoured to coerce the Par- liament, when he resolved to abolish the Test Act and Habeas Corpus Act, and when he announced to his Cabinet his intention to have the Test Act repealed by the Parliament, or to dispense with that DEVINS' WORM PASTILLES Abe ACKNOWLEDGED TO BE THE SAFEST AND Most E(-fectual Preparation for the destruction of worms in the HUMAN SYSTEM. 13 Act by his own authority, he turned the people of England against him. Against the will of the Parliament he defied the Test Act ; he filled the streets of London with priests ; Popish chapels were opened in every part of the country, and the King obstinately set himself against every form of English liberty. To Scotland he sent orders to dispense with the Test Act, and admit Catholics to all offices ; and he offered them free trade with England as a bribe ; but the Scotch were not to be bribed ; they peremptorily refused to obey the order. They accom- panied their refusal, when answering the King, with the words : " Shall we sell our God ?" In Ireland the old proprietors began to feel their hopes aroused of obtaining justice in reference to their confiscated estates. Irish Protestants had a feeling of insecurity, and to complete their apprehensions Clarendon was recalled, and their great enemy, Tyrconnell, was appointed Lord Lieutenant. Some fifteen hundred Protestant families abandoned their homes and occupations, and em- barked for England with the retiring Governor. The alarm was some- what mcreased by the new judicial appointments, which left only three Protestants on the Bench. Meanwhile, the English having determined to submit no long- er to the despotism of the King, called upon William, the Prince of Orange, to come over in right of his wife, and rescue the country from Popery and arbitrary power. On the fifth of Novem ber, 1688, William landed at Torbay; and James, deserted by his nobles, his army, and even his own children, left England to seek re- fuge at the French Court. In February, 1689, William and Mary were proclaimed as King and Queen of England, France, and Ireland, and in May, the Scotch tendered them the Crown of Scotland. It was not long, however, before James landed at Kinsale. in Ireland, with a small army, the Irish giving him a most hearty welcome. Arriving at Dubhn, in due course, he summoned his Irish Parliament. It was not the same Parfiament as formerly. It had formerly been a Parliament of Protestant Ireland, but now a great many Protestant landlords had quitted Ireland, and gone over to England. The Parliament that now met was a Catholic Parliament, composed of men with the memory of the most bitter wrongs heaped upon them for many centuries ; there were among them some of those three thousand, who, without com- pensation had been deprived of their estates, by the Act of Settlement. There was scarcely a man in that Dublin Parliament v^ho iiad not been injured by confiscations, frauds, and calumnies, perpe- DEVINS' WORM PASTILLES Abe Purely Vegetable. Agreeable to the Taste, Pleasing to the Sight, Simple IN Administeringi and Sure and Certain in their Effect. 14 trated and spread by their oppressors. It requires no stretcl> of imagination to know how that Parliament would be considered likely to act. It was naturally expected that they would act with small regard for vested interests. But what did they do ? They began by passing an act securing religious liberty to everybody in Ireland. (Cheers.) They next introduced an act to repeal Poyning's Law. They shewed themselves capable of legislating. I wish they could have been maintained. They could have maintained il, if, by another Act of Parliament, they could have swung the green isle a thousand miles out in the sea. They repealed the Act of Settlement. This was spoiliation of course ; but the principle of compensation was not known in those days ; and the Irish were the last people in the world to be expected to learn compensation from the lessons given by the English. I must say here that I do not find persecuiion in the Irish nature at all. (Applause.) It is tolerant, and not given to bigotry. (Renewed applause.) I give no " taffy" to the Irish; I simply speak the truth. To return to the Irish Parliament. They passed laws for the interest of shipping and navigation; and they shewed conclusively that the Irish Ca- tholics had an idea of govern- ing themselves, if they had a chance. These law-make: s re- solved that the old proprietors should be established in the possession of their lands. It was provided that those deprived of their lands by the Act of Settlement should re- enter at once. The persons to be dispossessed were of two kinds. Some were adventurers or soldiers of Cromwell ; and they were to be sent empty away. In their case it was an unconditional dismissal. The other kind were those who had come into possession by fair purchase ; and the Irish legislators maintained that they were entitled to reason- able compensation ; but any such possessors by purchase must be in- nocerit of having aided the Prince of Orange in his attempt on the crown, and any such as had so aided or abetted him, were to forfeit their estates, as were also any proprietors who were absent and did not return by a certain fixed day. The number of persons affected by this, and whose property was thus confiscated, was between two and three thousand, including men of all ranks. All property of absentees above seventeen years of age, was transferred to the King. The church pro- perty was transferred from the Protestant to the Catholic Church. But where was the compensation to be got for those possessors by fair pur- purchase, who were declared entitled to compensation ? They borrowed THE HEAD THAT ACHES USUALLY BELONGS TO THE PARTY WHOSE DIGESTION IS DISORDERED, MILK OF MAGNE SIA RELIEVES THE ONE AND REGULATES THE OTHER. 15 their idea from the EngUsh ; who trumped up some charge of treason, or pretended treason, whenever they wanted to pounce on Irish prO' perty ; and following this example the Irish Parliament deprived the King of the power of pardoning all who did not,' by a certain day, estab- lish their innocence of any connection with William's invasion ; thus actually rendering the clause of confiscation almost immediately opera- tive, especially against absentees. Taking high moral ground, one wrong can never justify another. But taking into account all previous events, if I were an Irishman, I should not be ashamed of the doings of that Irish Parliament. (Cheers.) But, of the Act of Attainder, I think they should be ashamed. A list of five hundred names was made of persons to be attainted of high treason, consisting of those who had actually assisted in the rebellion against the King ; and they were to be liable to all the penalties attaching to high treason ; but they were allowed until a certain day to justify themselves. The unfair part of this clause was, that the burden of proof was thrown on the accused to shew his innocence, and not on the prosecution to shew their guilt. And many were deprived of their lands for merely living out of Ireland in a time of civil com- motion ; some had no oppor- tunity of even seeing the lists of the attainted until after the per- iod of grace had expired. The only excuse that can be offered for this legislation is, that it was passec in a time of panic, and the legislators were inexperienced. With the King it was a war with William, a Protestant, — in fact a religious war, and a war involving, in the main, a contest for the throne of England.- With the Irish it was a war of the races ; a struggle by the Irish for their ancient rights. They wanted Ireland for the Irish ; (hear, hear), and their first step was to drive out the English. (Cheers.) Matters ivere soon brought to a climax. William at length invaded Ireland with a fine army. James, on hearing of William's arrival, hastened to join the Irish army then encamped at Dundalk, which place he abandoned and retreated to Drogheda, there occupying a position on the southern bank of the Boyne. On the 30th of June, 1690, William came with his army to the north bank of that river, and beheld James' camp posted along the opposite bank, with his flags and those of the French flying from the walls of Drogheda. William, as he viewed the sight, exclaimed, " I am glad to see you, gentlemen ; if you escape me, the fault will be mine." The morniiig of the first of July, dawned brilliantly; and the opposing armies were in motion by four o'clock. William's SOUND SLEEP 18 A BLESSING OFTEN DENIED TO THE DYSPEPTIC, BUT IF THE STOMACH IS RELIEVED, AND THE BOWELS REGULATED WITH MILK OF MAGNESIA IT IS SURE TO DISAPPEAR. 16 army advanced in three columns. The right wing, under Count Schom- berg, having gained the south bank of the river, attacked the Irish left flank ; but after some heavy fighting the English were compelled to fall back. The Irish horse held the English centre in check ; but William in person came up with the left, and with hard fighting, iiltiinately pre- vailed. James was a coward. Had he let the Irish aione, their defeat would not have been so certain, — :^'^j/ that he was ! (Cheers.) As it was, the issue of the contest remained doubtful to ihe very last moment of the day ; but ere the fate of the battle was quite decided James turned and fled, — coward that he was ! (Loud cheers.) " Change Kings with us," said an Irish officer to an Englishaian, who had taunted him with the panic, — "Change Kings with us, and we will fight you again." And so they would. (Hear, hear.) Since then the Irishman has proved his courage on a hundred battle fields. (Loud applause.) James had gone,. but the brave Irish made one more stand. They retreated beyond the Shannon, and made a most heroic defence of Limerick, which was be- sieged and stormed by William, who after several gallant attemps to carry it by storm, found it ne- cessary to retire. William finding it advisable to return to. England to attend to matters there, the war in Ireland was conducted during the winter by Marlborough and Ginckle, and continued in the following spring. Limerick was again besieged;, and at length capitulated under the terms of the Treaty of Limerick, which was signed on the third of October. It was stipulated that Catholics should enjoy the privilege of exercising their religion, and all those who had served James were guaranteed pardon and protection on taking the oath of allegiance to William and Mary. I want to re- mark here that this treaty was not kept. The signers of it could only enter into it subject to its ratification by larliament; and Parliament was not in the humour to ratify it in the strict letter of it. However, there was peace ; it was a peace of despair. No Englishman who loves what is good and noble in character can look back on these times in Ireland without shame ; no such Englishman can read that story of oppression and guilt, and feel that there is not an indelible stain on his country's glory. I want no dealings with the man who can glory in or excuse what was done in Ireland then. What was the character of the peace which the Treaty of Limerick gave them ? Most of the people became " hewers of wood and drawers of water," indeed; they were as completely slaves as ever were whipped by a master. After A SUDDEN DISAPPEARANCE OF HEARTBURN, NAUSEA, COSTlVENESS, AND OTHER SYMPTOMS OF DYSPEPSIA, IS PRODUCED BY MILK OF MAGNESIA. 17 the refusal to accept or confirm the articles of the Treaty of Limerick, — which would have given Catholics the free exercise of their religion and freedom to carry on their trades and professions, and several other privileges, — the Irish Parliament, controlled by the ascendancy- party, added to the number of pena) laws already in force against Catholics. An act was passed for preventing Protestants and Papists marrying together. Another was passed to prevent Catholics from being solicitors ; and another prohibiting Pai)ists being employed as game- keepers. I must confess I do not see what connection there is between solicitors ahd gamekeepers. Of course when men are doing dirty work they cannot be very nice about it. An act was also passed by the Irish Parliament to prevent the growth of Popery. It should real- ly have said, to abolish Popery. By the third clause, a Papist possessed of property could be deprived of the power to sell, mortgage, or other- wise dispose of any portion of it even by will, if one of his sons became a Protestant. By the fourth clause, a Popish father was debarred from being the guardian of his own child, and it is, by that clause, ordered that if a child of any age should declare itself a Protes- tant, it could be taken from its own father and placed under the care of the nearest relation of the Protestant religion. The sixth clause rendered Papists incapable of purchasing any manors, tenements, hereditaments, or any rents or profits arising out of any such, or of holding any lease of lives, or any other lease whatever, for a term exceeding thirty-one years ; and even with reference to such limited leases, if a Papist should hold a farm producing a profit greater than one-third of the amount of the rent, his right to it should cease, and pass over entirely to the first Protestant who should discover the rate of profit. It was also enacted by the seventh clause that all Catholics should be prohibited from succeeding to the properties or estates of their Protestant relations. For want of a Protestant heir the estate of a Papist was, by the tenth clause, to be divided amongst the sons ; for want of sons, amongst the daughters ; and, for want of daughters, among collateral kindred. A very good law, if applied to Catholics and Protestants, and English and Irish alike. Had the law of primogeniture been abolished then, there would have been less trouble now. (Cheers.) But this one-sided law had the effect of scattering the lands of one section of the people while another class were, by their exemption from it, accumulating and mul- tiplying their properties. It wa^ unfair ; it was unjust ; it was diabolical. SCIENTIFIC RESEARCH and EXPERIMENT HAS PRODUCED THAT HIGHLY IMPORTANT REMEDY PHILLIPS' PALATABLE COD LIVER OIL IN COMBINATION WITH PHOSPHO-NUTRITINE. 18 By the sixteenth clause all persons are required to take the oath of supremacy and the oath of abjuration, and the sacramental test, as a qualification for office and for voting in elections. The twenty-third clause deprived the Papists of Limerick and Galvvay of the protection guaranteed to them by the articles of the Treaty. The twenty-fourth clause requires the oath of allegiance to the Crown; and the twenty- fifth declares that all advowsons possessed by Papists should be vested in Her Majesty. I have read you these clauses one by one, so that you could judge for yourselves, and not .cly on any mere w^ord of mine. Protests were entered ; appeals were made to the Irish Parliament be- fore the final passing of the Act ; but protests, appeals, and prayers were in vain j for the Anglo-Irish had a mind to stamp out Popery. The Protestants were bitter. This law, or this violation of all law and justice, was simply a legalization of robbery and persecution. But that was not all, nor enough. In 1709, another Act to " explain and amend the Act to prevent the further growth of Popery," imposed additional penalties. The first clause declares that no Papist shall be competent to hold an annuity for life. The third provides that in case of any child of a Papist con- forming, it shall at once receive an annuity from the father, the High Court of Chancery shall have power and authority to compel the father to make discovery, upon oath, of the full value of his estate, real and personal, and thereupon make an order, accord- ing to the judgment of said Court, for the support of such conforming child, and for securing it a share of the property after the father's death. By the twelfth clause all barristers must educate their children as Protestants. The fourteenth and fifteenth clauses secure jointures to Popish wives, on their conforming. The sixteenth prohibits a Papist from teaching, even as an assistant to a Protestant master. The eighteenth offers a salary of thirty pounds a year to any Papist Priest on his conforming. I did not hear of any turning. (Applause.) The twentieth clause dealt with Popish Clergy and school-masters, and fixed the rewards to be given for their discovery. For discovering an arch-bishop, bishop, vicar-general, or other person exercising any foreign ecclesiastical jurisdic- tion, fifty pounds ; for discovering each regular clergyman, and each secular clergyman not registered, twenty pounds ; and for discovering each Popish school-master or usher, ten pounds. By the thirtieth clause, any Papist to be tried, must be tried by Protestants. Several other severities were imposed on the Catholics. No Papist in trade was to A New and Important Preparation of the Soluble Wheat Phosphates, is PHILLIPS' PALATABLE COD LIVER OIL IN combination WITH PH08PH0-NUTRITINE. 19 be allowed to take more than two apprentices. Then followed an Act to prevent Poj)ish Clergy coming into the kingdom. These are the penal laws ; and penal enough they were, God knows. No more atro- cious laws were ever enacted within the pale of civilization. The effect of all this was to subject the people of Ireland to the most shameful degradation and persecution ; they were ground down by the most ter- rible legal tyranny ever known, and of which no Englishman can speak without a blush of shame. I repeat that the English had ? mind to stamp out Popery ; and they took these extraordinary means of doing it, and of showing how much more like Christ Protestantism was than Catholicism, by legalizing robbery and persecution. The people learned to regard law as their natural enemy. In England, law and religion were on the same side, thus constituting a double authority in the magistrate and the clergyman, an authority which the people learned to respect and revere. But Ireland had no such teaching. To them law was only an ele- ment opposed to their religion, their rights in land and their trade : and it is easy for us to understand how very difficult it is for Ireland to believe that law and religion are united at LYMAN'S CSEERT TOOTE PASTE, Delicious and Cleansingr. last in the resolve and endea- vor to do them justice ; it is hard for them to believe that those who have exhibited such enmity in the past are now their friends, or that they are not still bent only upon confiscation and persecution. It is a most horrible thing to teach a people that lesson ; it must be subversive of every thing that tends to preserve the people's best interests. It is worse than bar- barism. The influence of these laws as regards property was hardly less disastrous. Even in trade the Irish had many disabilities. In 1772 we read that there is not one free man of the Catholic religion ; that Roman Catholics are not suffered to work at their respective trades ; that in many places in Ireland all the lucrative trades and professions are held by Protestants, who will not allow Catholics to be admitted, even as apprentices. The clause of the penal laws providing for the rewarding of discoverers of papists, brought into existence a whole profession of spies and informers ; and we read that in 1739 there were not twenty Papists who had jQzo value in land. A Catholic could not carry arms, without getting a license ; and he could only keep his horses and hunters at the risk of having them seized by any Protestant who might think proper to take a fancy to them and put a price on them. It is related of an Irish Catholic that be was riding in a car- riage drawn by two beautiful horses, when a man stopped the carriage, 20 tendered ten guineas, and claimed the horses as his own. The Irish gentleman drew out a pistol and shot them. Now, in this case, the man who claimed the horses was acting within the law, and the Irish gentleman was legally bound to submit, and deliver up the horses, unless he had the pluck to shoot them, — as he had. (Ai)plause). And then we must not forget that, besides all this, — many confiscations were very recent, the old possessors were living in i)overty, and still remembered their spoliation with bitterness ; so that the penal laws were mainly due to the fact that those holding the property felt that their possession was insecure. This made landlords reckless, arrogant, and extravagant, and bitterly hostile to every claim for the benefit of the Catholics. Why is Ireland unlike Scotland ? In England and in Scotland there have been centuries of cooperation between land- lord and tenant, which has knit their interests close together ; and in times of great struggles, in any extreme difficulty, they will find their natural leaders at their head, — men whom they can trust. But in Ireland, there are no such men in the shape of proprietors of land, — whom they can look to PAZIT BELZEVZE, For Znternal and. Sztemal TTse. as their proper natural leaders. The restrictions put on the free exercise of religion have hin- dered the progress of the Irish in education, and in every other respect. It has rendered it impossible for a man to have a career before him, unless by aposta- cizing himself, and sinking to the depths of degradation ; for I hold that it is degradation, of the vilest kind, for a man to change his religion, unless he changes it intellectually, and with pious motives. (Loud applause.) We can only imderstand the present condition of Ireland, by keeping well in mind this fact, that while in England and Scotland the people are drawn together by the cooperation of landlord and tenant, — in Ireland, they have been continually separated by every thing in the shape of one-sided legislation and oppression, on the part of the proprietary, that could divide a people. The landlords of Ireland are separated from their tenants by difference of race, by difference of religion, by partial laws, and by the memory of wrongs heap- ed, in the past, upon the people who form the Irish tenantry, by the ancestors of those who are the landlords ; and also by an unfair admin- istration of justice entirely under the control of these same landlords* Their will was law, and the people had to concur. The disregard for morals of the Irish landlords was made a by-word of reproach ; for their proffligacy was excessive. Everything tended to hinder anything done 21 to improve the condition of the Irish people. Everything was done that could be done against the encouragement of industry. The Navigation Act prohibited the English from importing Irish cattle. Manufacturing having increased, Englishmen and Scotchmen went over ; and began to grow rich. Wealth was accumulated from the manufacture of linen ; and it seemed as if Ireland would become very prosperous ; but England had not learned free trode. The woollen manufacture had grown in England. The American colonies afforded an extensive market for Irish linens. Restrictions, however, were placed upon Irish commerce. The industry of Ireland was destroyed. The Irish feared to export to any part, whatever. So manifest were the distresses of Ireland that in 1778, several resolutions were passed in the British Parliament recommending the expediency of removing many of the restrictions on Irish commerce ; but petitions poured in from the manufacturing towns of North Britain loudly denoun- cing the proposed legislation ; and the bills founded on these re- solutions were rejected. Poverty and misery were the result. There were three famines in twenty LTJBTS FAEISIA2T SAZH EElTS'TrSIl, Eestores Gray Bair to its Original Color, years ! and the people died by thousands ; men sickened and died everywhere, dead bodies were to be seen lying about in the fields ; but I do not want to linger on these horrible things . It has been asked why Ireland is so much behind other people in education ? I answer, simply because education has been denied [to the Irish. It is true that Henry the Eighth passed an act compeUing every clergyman to have a school in the parish ; but the Catholics were excluded by the penal code from teaching or even assisting to teach. The law aimed directly at keeping the people in ignorance. The osten sible object of the Protestants was, as these laws declare, tc rescue the souls of thousands of children from Popery. The idea was broad and comprehensive It was cleverly conceived. Let a bad season come ', it would bring on a famine. The society holding these schools proposed to take charge of the children of the distressed, to feed, clothe, and lodge them gratuitously ; to apprentice the boys, and to find a tritle of money to marry the girls ; but there was one condition,— that they should be educated as Protestants. Parents would be sorely tempted, in a time of distress, to put their children in these schools, and then withdraw them when the " pinch " was over. This happened quite naturally. But the result of it was that a law was passed by which such parents could not withdraw their children after once placing then under the care of the 22 society. It has been said that the charter schools were the best institu- tions in the world. Had the schools been mere industrial schools,, not interfering with the religion of its pupils in a coercive manner, then I could have agreed with this assertion j but when I see what they really did by interfering so completely with the domestic and religious feel- ings and inclinations of parents I cannot adopt the language used in praise of these schools. The parental instinct was and is as strong in the Irish as in the English breast ; and it was an unpardonable cruelty to place before the people the dreadful choice of seeing their children in dirt and misery, or of losing them altogether in order that they might be educated and cared for, and at the same time taught to despise their parents' religion. Had these societies gone to work in the name of charity, in a spirit of fairness and tolerance instead of starting out in a spirit of bigotry, and if they had not sought to force their religioa on the Irish in such a cruel manner, Ireland would have had a brighter history than she now reads through her hot blinding tears (Loud and long continued cheering). You may call to mind what has been done in England and ScotUnd, by LT7BTS ,.£ For tlie Bair, Is used 137 all tlie Crowned Beads * .. ..^^. of Europe. co-operation of landlord and tenant. If the Irish had only one third of the money taken out of the land and spent in England she would shew a bet- ter result. Many tenants never saw their landlords, and never thought of them except as high handed robbers. Many of them had let off their lands on long leases to specu- lators, who made a profit by subletting ; thus putting the control of the tenants into the hands of an inferior set of persons, necessarily protestants. In many cases the lands were underlet and sublet to such an extent that often as many as half a dozen intermediate land- lords stood between the leA owner or superior landlord and the actual tenant occupying and cultivating the land, — each of these living on the rents squeezed out of the overtaxed tenants. The tenantry sank lower and lower. They had no permanent interest in the soil. The English farmer was a capitalist. Not so the Irish farmer. He had neither money nor energy 3 and he found only the land between himself and starvation. Swift said it was the practice of the Irish tenant to offer higher rents than he could possible pay in order to obtain possession of land ; and in the vain attempt to meet his obligation be grew desperate and paid nothing (laughter). They had to build their own mud hovels and dig their own ditches, to pay a rack rent to the middle men, and tithes to the clergy. They never attempted to make improvements ; they had not 23 the means. Each poor wretch as he got a few acres was only anxious to get as much out of it as he could ; he could not make improvements, and he would not if he could : for, if he did, it meant more rent next year. (Applau- se.) Ireland had all the possibilities of a prosperous wealthy country. But its trade was restricted by legislation, and finally destroyed. Ireland was unfairly used by the English government ; and its elements of pros- perity were tied up, and allowed to rust. But a change came. The English government altered its attitude towards Ireland. A gleam of light shot across the Irish sky. Chatham was against removing catho- lic disabilities at first but the eloquence of Edmund Burke was too convincing and it was decided that Ireland had a right to live ; In 1778, an act was passed for the relief of His Majesty's subjects professing the Popish religion. This was a good beginning. But the act went further. It provided that catholics might take land on a lease for a term not ex- ceeding 999 years.— Quite long enough, surely. In 1792 another act was passed giving the catholics a right to purchase lands or take an interest therein. Many disabilities were removed ; and another act was passed allowing persons pro- LITBY'S For the Hair, Bequlres Imt to Ise used to lae appreciated. fessing the Catholic religion to teach it. But after all this was really only tinkering. There was no definite improvement. I believe that if England had treated with Ireland as a free nationality and recognized the Irish as such, or if she had absorbed Ireland as she absorbed Scotland there would have been no trouble at all ; but hsr policy towards Ireland has been most perverse. I have spoken of the acts giving tolerance to the Irish in matters of education and dealing with land ; but still the native Irish were " hewers of " wood, and drawers of water ; " because their Protestant masters, — who are like so many foreign settlers and resent being called Irish- men, — never associate with them to do them good. The Church of England in Ireland, — the Protestant Church, — was dominant over a Catholic people. The members of the Irish Parliament were practical- ly the nominees and under the control of a few influential persons in- stead of being the free choice of the people. But trouble came to England ; and this gave Ireland a chance. New England revolted, and old England was alarmed by her various troubles. Forty thousand volunteers were enrolled ; their delegates in convention passed resolutions requiring a reform of the Irish constitution. (Cheers.) It was a Protest- ant force with Protestant officers. I do not hear you cheer again. They made their claims, and they demanded, and got the independence of 24 the Irish Parli; ment. In 1782, Ireland had a national independence ; and was held .0 England only by the fact that the sovereign of one was tVc sov^^ign of the other. Home rule was granted. (Loud ciieerl^.; How did it answer? The dominant party was still the ^j^'jrity. The strangers for whom the peoples' lands had been forfeit- ed were the governing power still. It was not a government of the Irish, by the Irish ; but a government of the Irish by the English. And those who want Home rule now, had better look to it, if Home rule be granted, and see who will be constituted their rulers. The English go- vernment, before the independence of this Irish Parliament had been a check upon the dominant or ascendancy party in Ireland. But now the check was gone, poverty spread and deepened into misery. The sight of Ireland's distress moved the heart of Pitt, who introduced a bill ta emancipate the Catholics from their disabilities. By the power of his eloquence and the strength of his genius he fought it through, and it was sent to the Irish Parliament, only to be flung back by the Irish Protestant faction. The English war with France gave Ireland an- other chance. If there was a LTJBY'S For tlie Eair, Zs now tlie most popular Toilet SressinsT in use. country in a pitiable state it was Ireland at that time. There was a corrupt society and a divided people. A proposal came of amendments, both civil and military, which gave prom- ise of a new era of religious liberty and national freedom ; but the promise came too late. The United Irishmen had entered into correspondence with France ; the French revolution heated up the Irish Catholics to frenzy. Through the influence of Wolf Tone a junction was effected between the Catholics and the reforming dis- senters. The attacks of the Peep & day boys had called forth an oppo- sition association of Catholics, calling themselves the Defenders, which spread over the country, and soon proceeded from defence to aggression. A panic was spread among the landlords. The Peep d day boys, to keep it down, then formed an orange association. Here, in passing, I may remark, that, the Orange Society, has just as much right to walk as the Peep o' day boys, and no more. They formed themselves into secret societies to meet the secret societies about them. The United Irishmen sent Wolfe Tone to France to negotiate an alliance and raise an army. The Directory equipped an army for Ireland, and General Hoche accepted the command. Full of hope they embark - i and set sail for Ireland with this army. Had that army landed, IreLii>d might have thrown off" the English yoke ; but the winds were against Hoche, 25 as they had before been against the Spanish x\rmada ; and that French army never landed in Ireland. Still the threatened invasion was enough to bring vengeance on the poor Irish. The Protestant yeomanry rob- bed and ravaged at their will, Ireland drank in that deep hatred of the English and English rule, which long years of oppression had en- gendered. On the twenty-third May, 1798, the Catholic peasantry rose in arms 14,000 strong ; but their old misfortune overtook them. They were looking for help from France ; but it did not come. Wexford ^'as attacked ; the garrison which came out to meet them was defeated ; they took a considerable number of them prisoners, and then put them to death. Another body massacred a hundred Pro- testants in cold blood. The horrors they had suffered were fierce- ly avenged. They butchered, without mercy. Meantime General Humbert appeared in Killalla Bay, with 3 french frigates. He landed with a small army, which he augmented by Irish recruits. After a few- successes he was completely surrounded by the British and forced to surrender. The Irish rebellion was quelled ; and at once paved the way for the Union of the two parliaments. Pitt wanted this opportunity. Through the lord- lieutenant he proposed the union. The Irish parliament opposed it. But it was only a matter of money ; and Pitt bought them all body and soul for a million ; and in the year 1800, a bill for the legislative union of Great Britain and Ireland was made law. I need not continue the story at length to the time of the Ribbon men, and the great Dan O'Connell,— whom any nation might be proud to own, — and his efforts to obtain the repeal of Union for the abandon ment of which he accepted the complete emancipation of the catholics. I have not hesitated to dw^ll on English misrule. I have shewn you Ireland as an independent nation. I have shewn you that England's policy in governing Ireland was one of expediency. At one time pursuing a pacifying and petting policy, and then turning round and trampling it in the dust. But we cannot say that of the Government of the present day. It has a policy ; and that policy is justice to Ireland. (Applause.) The difficulties of the religious question did not quite dis- appear by the passage of the Emancipation Act. The Irish were forced into bitter hatred of Protestantism, because Protestantism in Ireland meant to the Catholics cruelty and misery ; but different acts followed the Emancipation Act ; and at last, in 1869, came the Act disestablishing the Irish Church (cheers) ; thus wiping out one of the greatest sources of •LTJBT'S Is the " Desideratum" of tlie day. 26 Irish trouble, for ever and ever. On the score of difficulty arising^ from legislation against the Catholic religion, there is nothing more to be said. The Catholic is as free, — he has every right, and every privilege, that a Protestant can enjoy. (Loud cheers). I have told you, — in reference to educational measures, — of the repeal of the acts forbidding catholics to teach. A great deal of good has been done by the National School system. Some of the people are ignorant still ; and so are some of the people in England ; and so are some of them in Canada. The School system has not done all it could do. Let the truth be told. I think I can be allowed now to tell the truth. (Hear Hear) It is due tr- the Church of the majority ; to the Irish people ; to- the Catholic clergy. Is the Cathechism the only, or the chief thing to be learned ? In my opinion, what is wanted for Ireland is a system of compulsory education, with the priest kept out (A voice " Oh ! oh !) I have fought that out in England, for myself, on many a platform (A voice, " Why didn't you say so before ?"). I am saying exactly what I think. (Hear, hear.) I have told you how Irish land changed hands by the three great confisca- tions; and of the difficulties of the poor occupiers of land holding as a tenant at will of the middle men to whom he had to pay a high rent, and of the chance he incurred of hav- ing his rent increased, if he made any improvements on the land. In 1849^ the government passed the Encumbered Estates Act which apparently rendered the landlord class little better than nominal proprietors. Still the Act did not produce such an improvement as was expected ; ini many cases it merely changed the proprietor ; rnerchants or capitalists buying up the estates that were loaded with heavy debts. The people grew miserable again, and discontent again prevailed. In 1870, Mr. Gladstone boldly grappled with the question, and passed the Landlord and Tenant Act. It provided that a tenant disturbed on leaving land occupied by him should be compensated. The English Government came to a determination that the Irish landlord should do justice to his tenants,that he should de?l fairly with them. By that act of 1870, com- pensation was made legal and binding, excepting when the tenant had a thirty one years lease, and the term expired during his occupancy. It gives the right to chose under what law or custom the tenant will settle his compensation. It also provides for the sale and transfer of land in legal form. I have often been asked why the Irish farmer is not E-'.tisfied now that he has practically a better tenure than LTJBT'S ' ' For tlie Sair, Zs no'w a Beqiuisite for every Toilet Table. 27 an Englishman and a Scotchman ; for while, with the latter a twenty- one years lease carries no compensation, there is in Ireland compensation for disturbance of the tenant who has not completed a thirty-one years term under a lease. That, so fas as it goes is very good, and sounds well. But we must remember that Irish history did not begin to be written in 1870 ; and it dates further back than 1800. In all Ireland there are some 21 million acres of land ; 175,000 acres of these are held by one person ; three persons hold more than t 00,000 acres each ; and in fact one third of the whole area is owned by two hundred and ninety-two persons. And the people remember how they came by it. They say, in effect : '* You have given us back those religious rights and privileges which '"you took away from us; you have disestablished the Church in *' Ireland. Religious liberty you have restored to us. But, gentlemen, ^' it never seems to have occurred to you to give us back our lands." (Loud cheers.) *' We are too poor to give you money for our lands ; ■" we are always in debt for our rent Give us back our own." That is what they say. I am free to confess that the matter is an extremely difficult one to deal with. It LTTBTS For the Hair, Seeps the Head clean and free foom Dandruff. is full of perplexity. It bristles with difficulty. Some of the possessors received their lands by purchase ; some were adven- turers who came in possession as payment for money lent to Government, or for arrears of pay for service in the army. Rights in land are not moral, but political, and the Act of Settlement was an Act, which an Act of Parliament can repeal or amend. Men are apt, in these things, to ignore the past. Parliament cannot say where moral right begins in regard to land which has changed hands politically. If a man shall say that moral right began with those soldiers and adven- turers, then it might be asked, why not begin the year before, or with •one of the other confiscations ? If confiscation is right, then, for the proper settlement of Ireland, why not confiscate now ? If on the other hand, confiscation is a wrong, then, two hundred years time have not made it right, but rather aggravated the wrong, by continuing, so long, to withhold the property from the original possessors. Shall we hand that land back ? I say ; No. And I hope every Irishman would say ; No. The balance of justice must be found. It is a difficult subject, as I have already said ; but one may form an opininion. I have form- ed my opinion ; and when I form an opinion I am in the habit of speaking it out. I force it upon no one ; just as no one can force an opinion on me, The law of primogeniture should be abolished in 28 Ireland. That would maintain a just regard forall vested interests ; and break up those great estates which ought to be broken up,and which to-day is one of the fruitful causes of Ireland's curse, l^et the government purchase land, and put it on sale, and make the purchase of it easy to the Irish peasants. Let the government buy from the landlords all the land they are willing to sell ; and I think a good many would be willing to sell to-day. (Laughter and cheers). Let the government buy all the land they can, and sell it to the Irish again on easy terms. Give compensation to landlords, as now given to tenants. Give free trade in land just as you have given free trade in all matters of indus- try. Provide that farms shall not be too large ; and provide that they shall not be too small. (Hear, hear.) I wish more of you said, " Hear, hear." (Loud cheers). Compel the landlord to cooperate with the tenant, as in England, by requiring the erection of suit- able houses and necessary out buildings. Have a generous policy ; and, for Ireland, Irish legislation ; so that this living in mud hovels on a few acres may come to an end. I would say, to the Irish r Have patience? You are the LTJBT'S Balsamic Properties strengrtliens "Weak Eair, and cliecks its fallingr out victims of misgovernment and oppression ; and the fault lies at your own doors, if you miss the present opportunity of ob- taining that justice which you are entitled to and which the English people as a whole are desirous of meting out to you. The better part of England is with you to day. We say : — Our fathers did wrong : but these centuries of injustice cannot be redressed in a day ; or just by one Act of Parliament. We must feel our way. To raise the question of primogeniture, in Ireland, to-day, is to raise that ghost over in England. And you know what that means. It would alarm that great body of landed proprietors, who are so powerful and wealthy in England ; and they will oppose it tooth and nail. There- fore be patient. Agitate, argue, discuss, all you can, but by legal means, not with the shilelah and the blunderbuss. The English tem- perament is against coercion, and it may turn ugly, if you arouse hostility. England is in favor of justice to Ireland, but she cannot be coerced, nor frightened by threats. She can be persuaded, but not driven; and she would despise and disown the legislators who should yield to coercion. You can help your cause by moderation and by patience. LTse all legitimate arguments ; and Ireland will get her rights ; for, in spite of the past, England will to herself be true. Let the Irish leaders denounce the use of cowardly weapons. We have 29 passed from the age of brute force to the age of justice. Let me tell you Ireland has thrown good chances away by want of prudence.*' Never had Ireland a better chance of obtaining justice than she has to day. You have not to contend now with Puritan bigotry or Protestant bigotry, as in the past. The English are not afraid of Popery or the Pope ; and the Jesuits driven from Catholic France may take refuge in Protestant England. (Loud applause.) The government of the day are sincerely desirous of rendering you justice ; and Irishmen may freely and confidently trust their cause in the hands of Gladstone and Bright. (Loud applause, long continued). But Gladstone and Bright are for law and order, and opposed to violence. A few more outrages, and they may be compelled to stop their work of reform ; more Boycotting, and the work of redress may be put back for another half a century. You may tie the hands of your best friends ; and then legislation will stop. Irishmen ! Be prudent. While agitating all you can, be prudent in your talk, and in your actions; and you will get justice ; because England is your friend. Make up your mind for that. You will get more from England than from LT7BTS For the Sair, may be imitated, but cannot be excelled. Italy or any where else. From my heart of hearts I wish jus- ticii peace and prosperity to Ireland by peaceful and pros- perous measures. (Loud and prolonged applause). ., Mr. Alderman Mooney moved a vote of thanks to the lecturer. Mr. F. B. McNamee seconded the motion, remarking that he thought and he was sure every person present would consider that the lecture was an intellectual treat. The Chairman in putting the motion said : In a question so difficult as that which the Rev. Mr. Bray has handled this evening, it is to be expected that there would be some expressions of opinion. In- deed, I noticed what might be possibly considered slight murmurs of disapproval from one or two voices in one part of the lecture ; but these were lost in the general applause. There can be no difference of opinion that there is a want of the panacea placed before you by the Rev. lecturer for the wrongs which he has so ably exposed, and which we would wish to forget. His lecture was indeed an intellectual treat as Mr. McNamee has aptly qualified it. Mr. Bray is entitled to our thanks ; and in order to ascertain that you all think so, those who wish to express their thanks will now hold up their right hand. (Cheers and cries of *' carried.") Now those who are against it. (Cries o " Not one, not one,^' and loud and enthusiastic applause.) I have 30 * very great pleasure in saying the "ayes" have it unanimously. (Re- newed cheering.) The Rev. Mr. Bray then stepped forward, and said: I hope the enthusiastic manner in which you have thanked me does not mean an " encore." (Laughter.) I know Montreal people have a weakness in that direction ; but I do not want to repeat my lecture again just now. If I have given you information, I am glad. If I have given you some idea of treating with the difficulties of Ireland, and how her condition is to be improved, I shall be glad. I wanted to put things as they are. I have read, — I don't know how many books, to try and understand the matter. Having done that I have formed my opinion. I have been blam'ed by many. I don't know that I am surprised. I should feel that I had entered into a new world if I had managed to get approval from both sides and from every body. Still I tried to do this, and I hoped I had succeeded, without exaggerating on either side. I tried to despel false notions such as these produced by such stories as that of this massacre that made Cromwell so mad, but LTJBY'S For the Sair, cro'Tms man with ^lory. which really had not taken place at all. I have been at- tacked in the papers on ac- count of the way in which I have spoken of Oliver Crom- well. I • have received letters because I have attacked Cromwell and his Irish campaign. I should attack any man if I thought he had done wrong (Hear, hear.) If you will allow me one word of egotism I will say that I know about twenty times more about this matter than these people do. I am op- posed to bigotry and tyranny in any shape or form. I am opposed to every thing that is antagonistic to the best interests of a people. I shall always oppose bigotry, — -Protestant bigotry, or Catholic bigotry, — and any thing that will hinder the people's progress. I am strongly oppos- ed to every kind of religious bigotry, I say this, although I am a clergy- man ; and, as a man, as a christian, — if my father had done a wrong thing, I should hold it as my duty to put that wrong thing right. (Ap- plause). Mr. Edward Murphy, after complimenting Mr. Bray on his able treatment of the subject, moved, — seconded by James O'Brien, Esq., that the lecturer be requested to give permission for the lecture to be printed ; as it was thought desirable to have it in a more permanent form. The motion was carried ; and Mr. McNamee then stepped for- ward, and said that Mr. Bray consented.