Remonstrance were excommunicated. Deprived of the means of subsistence by the loss of their situations, they could not well avoid starvation, except by submitting to their spiritual dictators. Those of them who fled into foreign countries did not much better their position, as they were in danger of being denounced as heretics, and of falling into the hands of the Inquisition. The Lord Lieutenant had been ostensibly directed to support them; but when they appealed to him for protection they could obtain no redress.1 Even when the Protestant primate complained of the harsh treatment they experienced, the Viceroy turned a deaf ear to his remonstrances.2

It might be said that in matters of spiritual jurisdiction, Government had no right to interfere; but, in this case, such an argument was scarcely relevant, as the question in dispute related to the encroachments of the Pope on the rights of temporal sovereignty. If any church, or its representative, claims prerogatives which are subversive of civil freedom, the State is clearly bound to interpose, and sustain those who uphold its independence. On this occasion, had Government been anxious to succour the Remonstrants, it might, without travelling beyond the bounds of its legitimate province, have found means to shelter them against oppression. But it had no desire to afford them aid. The Executive at this time gave grievous offence to the Irish Protestants by other proceedings which at the present day would be quite proper; but which, as the law then stood, involved its open violation. In various places Romanists were introduced into corporate towns, were permitted to become aldermen or common councillors, and were entrusted with the commission of the peace. The manner in which Peter Talbot, the Roman

1 The R. C. prelates were aware that Walsh would experience no sympathy from Government. In June, 1669, the R. C. Bishop of Meath could boast that he was obliged to leave Ireland; in the preceding May it was affirmed in Rome that "if the new Viceroy found Peter Walsh in Ireland on his arrival he would send him to the scaffold."-MORAN's Memoirs of Plunket, pp. 4, 25.

2 Mant, i. 654; Leland, iii. 463.

3 Sir Wm. Petty in his Political Anatomy of Ireland, written in 1672, states that "the number of sheriffs and sub-sheriffs, sheriffs' bailiffs, high and petty

Catholic Archbishop of Dublin, was suffered to deport himself, created still greater dissatisfaction. This ecclesiastic, who had so recently been appointed to his office by the Pope, was expected by his patron to employ all his authority in crushing those who had ventured to subscribe the Remonstrance. But he did not confine himself to the supervision of his own clergy. He announced that he had received special powers from the English sovereign: intermeddled in politics; and contrived in some cases even to overawe the Lord Lieu

tenant. The King, as afterwards appeared, had privately entered the Church of Rome prior to the Restoration; and Peter Talbot had been the officiating minister on the occasion of his admission. He had subsequently been well received at the English Court; he belonged to a highly respectable Irish family; and, as he was distinguished by activity and tact, he possessed a large amount of social influence. His knowledge of the grand secret of the King's conversion inspired him with confidence and led him to pursue a course on which he would not have otherwise adventured. On one occasion he had the assurance to appear before the council at Dublin in his archiepiscopal vestments-an act which involved a direct violation of the law-and yet the Lord Lieutenant overlooked this public defiance of authority. On another occasion he proposed to celebrate mass in the Irish metropolis with extraordinary splendour: and applied to Sir Ellis Leighton for the use of some hangings and plate, which formed part of the furniture of the castle, that they might grace the solemnity. The obsequious secretary complied with the request-expressing, at the same time, his hope that

3

constables, are about three thousand persons, whereof not above one tenth are English or Protestants."-Tracts, p. 379. We may infer from this that Romanists must have had far more than their fair share of public offices.

1 Leland, iii. 402-3. In April, 1762, we find the K.C. Bishop of Waterford, Dr. Brenan, stating that Peter Talbot and his brother, Colonel Talbot, were seeking to procure for Berkeley "a continuation in his office of Viceroy."MORAN'S Memoirs of Plunket, p. 223.

2 Carte, ii. 172; Renehan's Collections, p. 203.

3 He was brother of Archbishop Leighton, so well known in Scotland after the Restoration. Ellis became a convert to Popery. He died in 1684. Burnet describes him as a very immoral and worthless man. Hist. of his own Time, i. 189.

high mass would ere long be performed in Christ Church Cathedral,1

These proceedings were soon well known in the sister island; and, as there was a widespread impression among the more earnest Protestants of that country that the King was under Popish influence, they created no little uneasiness. The popular clamour so alarmed the British Cabinet that they deemed it prudent to remove Lord Berkeley from the Viceroyalty, and to appoint the Earl of Essex as his successor.2 When the English Parliament soon afterwards assembled, it agreed to present an address to the throne, relative to the affairs of Ireland. In this memorial His Majesty was requested to give order that no Romanists should be admitted as sheriffs, coroners, or justices of the peace in that country; that all licences authorizing them to reside in corporate towns should be withdrawn; that all prelates and others exercising ecclesiastical jurisdiction by the Pope's warrant should be commanded to leave the kingdom; that all convents should be dissolved, and all priests banished. The Court was obliged to give way to the pressure from without, and to pursue a somewhat different policy; but, withal, the Romish clergy managed, with little difficulty, to maintain their position in a land occupied so largely by their own adherents.*

1 Leland, iii. 462-3.

He

2 About this time Irish Protestantism gained a distinguished convert from the Church of Rome in Dr. Andrew Sall, a Jesuit, who had at one time been Professor of Moral Philosophy at Salamanca. He was of a highly respectable Irish family and a native of Cashel. He was led to embrace Protestantism after much careful investigation. He was well acquainted with the native tongue, and was employed for a considerable time before his death in the revision of Bedell's Bible. embraced Protestantism in 1674, when he was about sixty-two years of age. He was, in 1675, made Prebendary of Swords, and afterwards obtained other preferments. His adoption of Protestantism created a great sensation, and led to several controversial publications. He died in 1682. See Clogy's Memoirs of Bedell, p. 125, note; and Cotton's Fasti, i. 45.

3 Leland, iii. 466.

4 According to Sir Wm. Petty, Ireland had in 1672 a population of 1,100,000, divided into 800,000 Romanists and 300,000 Protestants of all denominations. But though this estimate has been often quoted and accepted, its accuracy may be fairly challenged for the following reasons:-I. Petty admits that, in the same year, the English and Protestants, though confessedly superior in wealth and education, held not more than one-tenth of the public offices. II. It appears, from his own

In 1677, the Duke of Ormonde-who had long been out of favour with his sovereign-was re-appointed Lord Lieutenant. At this period the Duke was by far the most influential statesman connected with Ireland; for he was greatly respected, as well by the Roman Catholic as by the Protestant nobility. But, though not indisposed to treat the adherents. of Popery with indulgence, he was cordially hated by the great body of the priests. They knew that he was the patron of Peter Walsh; and they believed that, in the days of the Catholic Confederation, he had blighted their hopes of political ascendency. He had not long entered on his Irish administration when the neighbouring island was thrown into a state of excitement by the alarms of popish conspiracies; and several wicked adventurers-among whom Titus Oates has acquired an infamous notoriety-took advantage of this morbid con

reckoning, that in 1652, at the end of the Civil War, the population amounted to 850,000, divided into 700,000 Romanists, and 150,000 Protestants of all denomitions. III. If we take the census first published by Mr. Hardinge (see before, p. 127, note (2) ), and found among the papers of Sir Wm. Petty, as an account of the males in 1659, and assuming it to represent the one-half of the population, it follows that in all there were then in the country 827,968 Irish, and only 172,214 English and Scotch. IV. Between 1659 and 1672 we have no reason to believe that there was any considerable increase among the Protestant non-conformists, as many of them in disgust left the country and removed to America. Neither have we any reason to believe that the Irish declined in numbers, as their circumstances were in every way improved after the Restoration. But if the Irish and the English and Scotch existed in the numbers indicated in 1659, it would seem, from Sir Wm. Petty's reckoning, that, during the next thirteen years, the Romish population diminished, whilst the Protestants increased 75 per cent. V. We know that about this time in most of the towns of Leinster, Munster and Connaught, there were three Romanists to one Protestant, whilst in rural districts, as Sir Wm. Petty himself acknowledges, the Romanists were as twenty to one Protestant. (Tracts, p. 376. See also Moran's Mem., p. lxv.) As to the population of Kilkenny in 1659, see before, p. 121, note (1). VI. About this very time well-informed Romanists, such as Talbot, R.C. Archbishop of Dublin, reckoned that their coreligionists were to the Protestants as six to one. See a remarkable paper drawn up by him in 1671 in King's State of the Protestants in Ireland, p. 291. ed. London, 1692. VII. In the paper just mentioned-a document evidently drawn up with great care-Talbot reckons the population at that time as 1,200,000. According to another estimate it amounted to 1,320,000. See Hardinge, Trans. of Royal Irish Academy, vol. xxiv. Antiq., part iv., p. 327. We may infer, for these reasons, that the estimate of Petty cannot be sustained. We would not perhaps greatly err were we to say that in 1672 there were in Ireland not more than 250,000 Protestants, and not less than 950,000 Romanists.

dition of the public mind to concoct tales which produced a prodigious sensation. There were, no doubt, Jesuits at this time prepared to sanction any piece of villany likely to advance the interests of their Church; and the cruel treatment now experienced by the Protestants of France may be traced directly to their intrigues; but the stories of Oates and his coadjutors appear to have been a tissue of fabrications. They obtained, however, ready credence; and led to fresh inflictions of pains and penalties on Romanists. It was to be expected that, at such a juncture, the state of Ireland would awaken the anxiety of a Protestant Government; and that the laws against recusants would be enforced with increased severity. The professors of the obnoxious creed were dis- . armed; and, as the Romish clergy were supposed to sympathize with the tories, or banditti who infested several districts. of the country, a proclamation was issued directing that any popish priest, in any place where murder or robbery was committed by these freebooters, should be lodged in prison. and transported, unless within fourteen days the guilty persons were killed or taken, or such discovery made that they could be brought to justice.1

The concoctors of the Popish Plot affirmed that it extended to Ireland, that men of high consideration in this country were involved in it, and that persons had been hired to assassinate the Lord Lieutenant. But, with all his vigilance, and with the best means of procuring information, Ormonde could discover no trace whatever of the existence of any such dark design. The evidence against the accused possessed transparent marks of falsehood: for some, who were arraigned as chief conspirators, were incapacitated by extreme age or infirmity from engaging in the schemes imputed to them; and it was obvious that the depositions had been framed in total ignorance of their actual condition. Peter Talbot, the Romish Archbishop of Dublin, who was represented as organizing insurrection, now suffered from disease; and was in such a state of pain and languor as to be unfit to undertake

1 Leland, iii. 475.

2 Ibid. iii. 477, 479.