IX. The oath to be administered to such Roman Catholics as submit to their Majesties Government, shall be the oath abovesaid, and no other. X. No person or persons who shall at any time hereafter break these articles, or any of them, shall thereby make, or cause any other person or persons to forfeit or lose the benefit of the same. XI. The Lords Justices and General do promise to use their utmost endeavours, that all the persons comprehended in the abovementioned articles, shall be protected and defended from all arrests and executions for debt or damage, for the space of eight months next ensuing the date hereof. XII. Lastly, the Lords Justices and General do undertake, that their Majesties will ratify these articles within the space of eight months, or sooner, and use their utmost endeavours that the same shall be ratified and confirmed in parliament. XIII. And whereas Colonel John Brown stood indebted to several Protestants, by judgments of record, which appearing to the late government, the Lord Tyrconnel, and Lord Lucan, took away the effects the said John Brown had to answer the said debts, and promised to clear the said John Brown of the said debts; which effects were taken for the public use of the Irish, and their army: for freeing the said Lord Lucan of his said engagement, past on their public account, for payment of the said Protestants, and for preventing the ruin of the said John Brown, and for satisfaction of his creditors, at the instance of the Lord Lucan, and the rest of the persons aforesaid, it is agreed, that the said Lords Justices, and the said Baron De Ginckle, shall intercede with the King and parliament, to have the estates secured to Roman Catholics, by articles and capitulation in this kingdom, charged with, and equally liable to the payment of so much of the said debts, as the said Lord Lucan, upon stating accounts with the said John Brown, shall certify under his hand, that the ef fects taken from the said Brown amount unto; which accompt is to be stated, and the balance certified by the said Lord Lucan in one and twenty days after the date hereof: For the true performance hereof, we have hereunto set our hands, Present, SCRAVENMORE. H. MACCAY. T. TALMASH. CHAR. PORTER. THOS. CONINGSBY. ! AND whereas the said city of Limerick hath been since, in pursuance of the said articles, surrendered unto us. Now know ye, that we having considered of the said articles, are graciously pleased hereby to declare, that we do for us, our heirs, and successors, as far as in us lies, ratify and confirm the same, and every clause, matter, and thing therein contained. - And as to such parts thereof, for which an act of parliament shall be found to be necessary, we shall recommend the same to be made good by parliament, and shall give our royal assent to any bill or bills that shall be passed by our two houses of parliament to that purpose. And whereas it appears unto us, that it was agreed between the parties to the said articles, that after the words Limerick, Clare, Kerry, Cork, Mayo, or any of them, in the second of the said articles, the words following, viz. “And all such as are under their protection in the said counties," should be inserted, and be part of the said articles. Which words having been casually omitted by the writer, the omission was not discovered till after the said articles were signed, but was taken notice of before the second town was surrendered: and that our said justices and general, or one of them, did promise that the said clause should be made good, it being within the intention of the capitulation, and inserted in the foul draft thereof. Our further will and pleasure is, and we do hereby ratify and confirm the said omitted words, viz. "And all such as are under their protection in the said counties," hereby for us, our heirs and successors, ordaining and declaring, that all and every person and persons therein concerned, shall and may have, receive, and enjoy the benefit thereof, in such and the same manner, as if the said words had been inserted in their proper place, in the said second article ; any omission, defect, or mistake in the said second article, in any wise notwithstanding. Provided always, and our will and pleasure is, that these our letters patents shall be enrolled in our court of Chancery, in our said kingdom of Ireland, within the space of one year next ensuing. In witness. &c. witness ourself at Westminster, the twentyfourth day of February, anno regni regis & reginæ Gulielmi & Mariæ quarto per breve de privato sigillo. Nos autem tenorem premissor. predict. Ad requisitionem attornat. general. domini regis & dominæ reginæ pro regno Hiberniæ. Duximus exemplificand. per presentes. In cujus rei testimonium has litteras nostras fieri fecimus patentes. Testibus nobis ipsis apud Westmon. quinto die Aprilis, annoq. regni eorum quarto. Examinat. S. KECK. per nos. 1 LACON WM. CHILDE.. BRIDGES. In Cancel. } Magistros. If this treaty is only considered according to those rules of common morality, which influence the conduct of man to man; if, in proportion to the great advantages which England derived from it, she was bound to construe it with liberality, as well as to execute it with good faith; then the Irish Catholics must be considered as placed by it in a situation nearly of complete equality with their Protestant countrymen. The free exercise of their religion was granted in the most unqualified manner: Security of property was as fully confirmed to them. In regard to personal security, they were pardoned all misdemeanors whatsoever, of which they had been guilty. As to political power, inasmuch as the 9th article stipulated, that the oath to be administered to such Catholics as submitted to his Majesty's government, should be the oath of allegiance of the first year of the reign of William and Mary, and no other, they were entitled by the treaty to sit in parliament, and to vote at elections; no law being then in existence to deprive them of those rights; and they were also entitled to enjoy every other political right in common with all the King's subjects, except civil and corporate offices. * The practice of the several trades or professions was secured to them. They were allowed the use of arms, some of them especially, but all of them in consequence of no limitation or exception to the contrary. Even the laws which were in force against the Catholics, when the treaty took place, ought, according to the first article, to have been repealed†; because their * The articles of Limerick were signed by De Ginckle on the 3d of Oct. 1691. The English parliament that passed the 3d W. and M. c. 2. by which Irish peers and members of parliament were first excluded from sitting in parliament by being required to take the oath of supremacy, met on the 22d Oct. 1691. According to the constitution of Ireland, as granted by Henry II. and confirmed in 1782, this act of the 3 W. and M. c. 2. was not binding in Ireland, and though the Catholics submitted to it, they were not legally excluded from parliament till the 22d year of his present majesty's reign. This act was in direct violation of the treaty of Limerick. Catholics were excluded from offices by the acts of Charles II., mentioned in the following note. These laws were, 1st. An act against the authority of the See of Rome. It enacts, that no person shall attribute any jurisdiction to the See of Rome; that the person offending shall be subject to a premunire; and, that all who have any office from the king, every person entering into orders, or taking a degree in the University, shall take the oath of supremacy. 2d. An act restoring to the crown the antient jurisdiction over the state, ecclesiastical and spiritual. It likewise enacts, that every ecclesiastical person, every person accepting office, shall take the oath of supremacy. 3d. An act for the uniformity of Common Prayer. It enacts, majesties engaged, by this article, to obtain for the Catholics such further security, in respect to the exercise of their religion, as might preserve them from any disturbance on account of that religion. It is impossible for any other fair construction to be given to this article, than that which is here given. It would be beneath the dignity, and wholly inconsistent with that character for good faith, of which it has always been the pride of England to boast, to attempt to apply any other meaning to it. No doubt there are those who would wish to act, on all occasions, towards the Catholics, according to that system of perverted morality which the powerful always impose on the weak; but, so long as the true principles of justice shall have their due influence, the majority of mankind can never consider this first article of the treaty of Limerick in any other light, than as a complete and perpetual exemption of the Irish Catholics from all political and religious disqualification on account of their religion. This treaty has been very accurately described as the great charter of the civil and religious liberty of the Ca that every person, having no lawful excuse to be absent, shall, every Sunday, resort to some place of worship of the established church, or forfeit 12d. 4th. An act, by which the Chancellor may appoint a guardian to the child of a Catholic. 5th. An act by which no Catholic schoolmaster can teach in a private house, without a license from the ordinary of his diocese, and taking the oath of supremacy. 6th. The new rules, by which no person can be admitted into any corporation without taking the oath of supremacy. This statement is taken from the Report of the Committee of the House of Commons appointed in 1697, to consider what penal laws were then in force against the Catholics.-Com. Jour. of Ireland, vol. ii. |