Catholics incredible on their oaths." Having made an estimate of the value of the income of the clergy; then they calculate, and, like the industrious ant, or the busy bee, thymo crura plena, depositing, in the episcopal cells, the bulky store of ecclesiastical revenue, they return to the crowd, and expostulate with their brethren on the poverty of the church.

I speak of some, not all. There are among them, men whom I revere. Such is one whom I do not name, because he is present; mild, learned, pious and benevolent; a friend to the meekness of the gospel, and a friend to man. Such is another whom I may name, because he is not present. He has the first episcopal dignity in this realm....it is his right....he takes it by virtue of the commanding benevolence of his mind, in right of a superior and exalted nature. There are men possessed of certain creative powers, and who distinguish the place of their nativity, instead of being distinguished by it....they do not receive, they give birth to the place of their residence, and vivify the region which is about them. The man I allude to, I know not, or know him as we know superior beings, by his works.

I have, in the foregoing part, endeavoured to defend myself against an attack, published without the names of certain dignitaries of the church, but not without their authority: I shall now strive to answer another attack, published by their authority, and with their names annexed....the parochial clergy of Munster, at their annual visitations assembled.

A very respectable assembly; how employed? To assist the committee appointed by act of parliament to enquire into the scandalous abuses which have sunk the charitable funds of royal and private donation?.... No, from the Southern archbishop that committee has received no assistance.... To establish parochial schools, according to act of parliament, at their own expence ?.... No, that work has been neglected....To establish diocesan schools, at their own expence, as by law they are obliged?.... No, that too has been neglected or perverted.... To enquire into the state of charter schools, and to follow Howard in his pious and singular activity?.... No, the parochial clergy of the province of Munster, at their visitation, have been otherwise employed. They have read a speech concerning tithes, their property, and yet there were subjects more worthy of their interference! Their God has been denied by the arguments of the Atheist; his Son has been denied by the arguments of the Deist. English bishops, Presbyterian ministers have come forth....The parochial clergy of Munster, and their six bishops....have they signalized themselves in this holy war?....Their learning....their industry.... their zeal on their natural subject....I look for....I cannot find them....Their country, as well as their God, had been outraged ....her trade crippled, her constitution destroyed, and her final

judicature, of which the right reverend the lords spiritual compose an implicit part, usurped. What an opportunity here for their interposition during a long period! Where are their spirited votes? Where are their deep researches? A layman indeed, on that occasion, came forth, Molyneux came forth; and, though he could not retake the citadel, he rescued the holy vestiges, the vestal fires of the constitution, and rescued them without aid from the dignified priests of the temple. A most successful struggle to recover trade and freedom was afterwards made.... what an opportunity here! The Presbyterian ministers came forward in every shape; the Roman Catholic priest afforded us his literary assistance; the parochial clergy of Munster, and their six bishops....not one syllable....on their part a sad blank.... profound, uninterrupted taciturnity. When their God, their Redeemer, and their country are in question, they are silent; but, when a twelve-penny point on their tithe is brought forward, then they are vivacious; then the press groans with clerical Billingsgate; then a synod is held in the capital, in the seat of learning, under mitred auspices, training up the reverend youth of the country in the holy office of anonymous publication, and inoculating their tender minds with the scribbling itch of meagre production; and then the parochial clergy of Munster, deans, deacons, archdeacons, prebendaries and precentors, with six bishops in holy order, and solemn march, advance....on what? On the principles of decorum and respect due to a member of the legislature: "The provincial clergy having read a speech, entitled by the publishers the speech of Mr. "Grattan, and by him not disavowed." Their bishops should have informed their clergy, that, to justify the application, it is not sufficient the publication should not be disavowed, but necessary that it should be authorized. Giving a reason for the application, and giving a bad one, they convict themselves of making the charge, and of making it without foundation. Here I must suggest an established rule, which I scorn to insist on, but am forced to acknowledge. No man, no body of men, have a rightto charge on a member of the legislature, as his speech made therein, an unauthorized publication. Against this rule have transgressed those anonymous and wrathful clergymen, who, in a flock of noisy publications, have attacked what I never published, and replied to what I never said. They are welcome; they have shewn that all of them can write, it remains for them to shew that some of them can excel....their patrons I hope will reward them! The flies of the vintage they gather about the press, and already taste, in devout expectation, the inspiring fruit. A light swarm! that they should travel over boundaries I am not astonished; but that the grave body, the parochial clergy of Munster, with their six bishops....they too are wel

come.

I should be the last man to avail myself of an intemperance, and they are the last body against whom I should insist upon it. Requesting therefore, that when the exalted of their body complain of encroachment, they may extend to others that indulgence, which they themselves (it appears) sometimes stand in need of, I shall wave the irregularity of the attack, and suppose the parochial clergy of Munster to have come forward in a shape, in which they are not exposed to a censure, but entitled to an answer. 'Tis a matter of anxiety to know what is the evil they advance to combat....they state it, "Lest an anony-. mous pamphlet should, in their own province, prejudice them in the opinion of men unacquainted with their persons or moderation." If by such they mean people of the other provinces, I do not see how the parochial clergy of Munster can be specially affected in their own province, by the opinion of men who live out of it; but, if they wish to recommend themselves to such, if the opinion of such men is worth their attention, the parochial clergy of Munster must take measures very different from the manifesto; they must agree to an exemption for the potatoes of the peasant; they must agree to an exemption for the flax of the manufacturer; they must accede to a modus, not a manifesto. But, if the parochial clergy of Munster are indifferent about the opinion of the other provinces, and by men unacquainted with their persons and moderation, mean their own parishioners, I marvel much that these grave and enlightened men should allege so slight and sarcastic a cause for their momentous interposition, assigning, on the first supposition, a very inadequate, on the second supposition, a very extraordinary, and on neither the real cause for their manifesto. When a great body condescends to give a reason for its proceedings, that reason should be excellent; and rather than have offered such a one as they have submitted, I think the parochial clergy of Munster had more consulted their dignity, by assigning no reason at all, by resting every thing on their authority, and by standing forth in the public prints, a great name without an argument.

Having professed such an object for interposing the parochial clergy of Munster endeavour to accomplish that object by a manifesto, declaring that the prices set forth in the speech alluded to do greatly exceed the prices demanded by the clergy of Munster, and are gross misrepresentations. Here it becomes of moment, to know what are these prices set forth in the speech. I do not find, the speech relies on prices for wheat, which exceed 16s. the acre, or on prices for potatoes, which exceed 27s. the plantation acre. But such prices, or any thing near such prices, are bad enough in all conscience. Whether the prices are 10s. for wheat, or 13, 14, 16, 20, or 27s. the acre,

for potatoes, they are unconscionable. I agree with the parochial clergy of Munster, in their honest indignation at the perusal of such charges; they are enormous, uncharitable, and unchristian: the next question is, where these charges have been found?.... In the returns of the judge, or of the proper officer, appointed by the proper court to try bills or petitions under the compensation act; charges, which by the act must be the usual charges of three years back, and which must be verified by affidavit; so that this manifesto is nothing more than a declaration, that the prices reported by the judges or triers, and verified by the oath of the parsons, or their witnesses, do greatly exceed the real prices, and are gross falsehoods; that is, that the witnesses in these cases concerned for the clergy, have been guilty of perjury. But as this is impossi ble, we must suppose, that these prices are not chargeable with falsehood, but so chargeable with excess, that they become incredible from their enormity; and thus this declaration of the parochial clergy of Munster is nothing more than a manifesto against the exactions of their own body. These clergymen.... these tithe-farmers....or these tithe-proctors, who have recovered under this act, and who by themselves or their witnesses, have sworn to such scandalous charges, should take notice, that they are proclaimed by the parochial clergy of Munster, at the annual visitation assembled; that the prices demanded by said persons, are proclaimed and stigmatized, and publickly disavowed and reprobated by the bishops and the clergy of the province of Munster, at their annual visitation assembled; that these prices are pronounced not only to exceed what they themselves demand, but to exceed their demand in a very high degree, to be not only exorbitant charges, but incredible calumnies.... Miraculous! that the clergy of Munster, with their six bishops, unconsciously led, but happily influenced, meaning only to attack a member of parliament, should, by a blind, but heaven-directed zeal, pronounce ecclesiastical and episcopal judgment against unconscionable tithe. See the first fruits of the zeal of a layman, and the temerity of a bishop.

The parochial clergy of Munster, having in the first paragraph of their manifesto, affirmed a universal proposition, are advised in the second, to give that paragraph a contradiction. they are of opinion, that the prices set forth in the speech, and denied in the manifesto, may exist notwithstanding; but if they do, they are only apparently high, and are really justifiable. In the first paragraph, they are advised to decide against their existence and moderation. "They greatly exceed the prices demanded, they are false, they are calumnious." In the second, they are advised to change their opinions with respect to both; they may not be false, they may be justifiable....the contradic

tion is of little moment; the justification must be observed upon: is 12, 13, 14, 15, 20, 278. an acre for potatoes, justifiable? Have the provincial clergy of Munster, with six bishops at their head, come forth to tell us this? Have the parochial clergy of Munster come forth to excuse extortion? Do the parochial clergy of Munster design by such a justification, to recommend themselves either in or out of their province, to those who are, or to those who are not, acquainted with their persons, and who are yet to be acquainted with their moderation? I did hope, that the parochial clergy of Munster, at their annual visitation assembled, would have held a different language, and instead of reading newspapers, or answering pamphlets, would have employed those sage and sacred moments to restrain exaction, and to animadvert on improper ministers. Here I see and lament that fatal spirit of corps, which arms the enemies, and discomfits the real friends of the church. The reverend and learned body read in the pamphlet, certain figures of unjust prices, with natural indignation. But they were brought to recollect, that these prices might be the charges of a brother churchman. In their capacity, as men and gentlemen, they abhor: in their corporate capacity as priests, they are advised to apologize; hence a confusion of style from a distraction of sentiment; hence the printer, who puts down the figures of certain prices is guilty: the minister who exacts them....innocent. A piece of money, which in numbers tells as exaction, being deposited in the pious hand of a spiritual pastor, undergoes a sort of transubstantiation, and is only apparently high, while the clerical offender is acquitted by a miracle, and this miraculous benefit of clergy is extended to the lay, as well as the ecclesiastical owners of tithe; and to all the low and wretched train of persons of various professions and religi ons, connected with its collection. I excuse the zeal of the parochial clergy of Munster, I say nothing of their discretion. I applaud the first motions of their heart: I am sure the majority of them scorn to practise what they are influenced to extenuate: but do not these worthy men perceive, that while they insist on the moderation of such practices, they may bring into question the moderation of their own principles, and teach the public to fear, lest these prices, which are now the subject of their Defence, may become hereafter the object of their imitation? The progress of exaction is well known: from general indignation to special toleration; from special toleration to general adoption. I own I see the necessity of my bill now, emphatically now; just at the critical period before those high charges have become a general practice; and when they begin to receive a degree of countenance; when the balance of charity trepidates in episcopal hands; when Exaction has not lost all her native horrors, and yet is growing somewhat familiar to their eyes; is only apparently high....probably justifiable.