of Ireland. The measure was arrested at its inception. The minister fell; and in deference to the king's feelings, was constrained to renounce his own wise and liberal policy.' condition But the question of Catholic disabilities, in connection with the government of Ireland, Critical was too momentous to be set at rest by of Ireland. the religious scruples of the king, and the respectful forbearance of statesmen. In the rebellion of 1798, the savage hatred of Protestants and Catholics had aggravated the dangers of that critical period. Nor were the difficulties of administering the government overcome by the Union. The abortive rebellion of Robert Emmett, in 1803, again exposed the alarming condition of Ireland; and suggested that the social dislocation of that unhappy country needed a more statesmanlike treatment than that of Protestant ascendency and irritating disabilities. For the present, however, the general question was in abeyance, in Parliament. Mr. Pitt had been silenced by the king; and Mr. Addington's abeyance. administration was avowedly anti-Catholic. Yet in 1803, Catholics obtained a further instalment of relief, being exempted from certain penalties and disabilities, on taking the oath and subscribing the declaration prescribed by the Act of 1791.2 The Catholic question in Mr. Pitt, In 1804, a serious agitation for Catholic relief commenced in Ireland: but as yet the cause was without hope. On Mr. Pitt's 1804-5. restoration to power, he was still restrained by his engagement to the king, from proposing any measure 1 Supra, Vol. I. 92-97. 2 43 Geo. III. c. 30. for the relief of Catholics himself; and was even obliged to resist their claims when advocated by Catholic petition, March 25th, 1805. Lord Gren ville's motion, May 10th, 1805. others. In 1805, the discussion of the general question was resumed in Parliament by Lord Grenville, who presented a petition from the Roman Catholics of Ireland, recounting the disabilities under which they still suffered.2 On the 10th May, his lordship moved for a committee of the whole House to consider this petition. He urged that three-fourths of the people of Ireland were Roman Catholics, whose existence the state could not ignore. At the time of the Revolution they had been excluded from civil privileges, not on account of their religion, but for their political adhesion to the exiled sovereign. In the present reign they had received toleration in the exercise of their religion, power to acquire land, the enjoyment of the elective franchise, and the right to fill many offices from which they had previously been excluded. Whatever objections might have existed to the admission of Roman Catholics to the Parliament of Ireland, had been removed by the Union; as in the Parliament of the United Kingdom there was a vast preponderance of Protestants. This argument had been used by those who had promoted the Union. It had encouraged the hopes of the Roman Catholics; and now, for the first time since the Union, that body had appealed to Parliament. His lordship dwelt upon their loyalty, as frequently declared by the Irish Parliament, exone 1 Lord Stanhope's Life of Pitt, iv. 297, 391. 2 Hans. Deb., 1st Ser., iv. 97. rated them from participation, as a body, in the Rebellion, combated the prejudice raised against them on account of the recent coronation of Napoleon by the pope, and illustrated the feelings which their exclusion from lawful objects of ambition naturally excited in their minds. He desired to unite all classes of the people in the common benefits and common interests of the state. This speech, which ably presented the entire case of the Roman Catholics, opened a succession of debates, in which all the arguments relating to their claims were elicited. As regards the high offices of state, it was urged by Lord Hawkesbury, that while the law excluded a Roman Catholic sovereign from the throne of his inheritance, it could scarcely be allowed that the councils of a Protestant king should be directed by Roman Catholics. Roman Catholics, it was argued, would not be fit persons to sit in Parliament, so long as they refused to take the oath of supremacy, which merely renounced foreign dominion and jurisdiction. In Ireland, their admission would increase the influence of the priesthood in elections, and array the property of the country on one side, and its religion and numbers on the other. The Duke of Cumberland opposed the prayer of the petition, as fatal to all the principles upon which the House of Hanover had been called to the throne. Every apprehension and prejudice which could be appealed to, in opposition to the claims of the Roman Catholics, was exerted in this debate. The pope, their master, was the slave and tool of Hans. Deb., 1st Ser., 1v. 651-729, 742. Napoleon. If entrusted with power, they would resist the payment of tithes, and overthrow the established church. Nay, Catholic families would reclaim their forfeited estates, which for five generations had been in the possession of Protestants, or had since been repurchased by Catholics. After two nights' debate, Lord Grenville's motion was negatived by a majority of 129.1 Mr. Fox also offered a similar motion to the Com Mr. Fox's mons, founded upon a petition addressed to that House. The people whose cause he was advocating, amounted, he said, to be tween a fourth and a fifth of the entire population of the United Kingdom. So large a portion of his fellow-subjects had been excluded from civil rights, not on account of their religion, but for political causes which no longer existed. Queen Elizabeth had not viewed them as loyal subjects of a Protestant Queen. The character and conduct of the Stuarts had made the people distrustful of the Catholics. At the time of the Revolution 'it was not a Catholic, but a Jacobite, you wished to restrain.' In Ireland, again, the restrictions upon Catholics were political and not religious. In the civil war which had raged there, the Catholics were the supporters of James, and as Jacobites were discouraged and restrained. The Test Act of Charles II. was passed because the sovereign himself was suspected; and Catholic officers were excluded, lest they should assist him in his endeavours to subvert the constitution. There was no fear, now, of a ■ Contents, 49; Non-contents, 178. Hans. Deb., 1st Ser., iv. 843. Protestant king being unduly influenced by Catholic ministers. The danger of admitting Catholics to Parliament was chimerical. Did any one believe that twenty Catholic members would be returned. from the whole of Ireland ?1 In reply to this question, Dr. Duigenan asserted that Ireland would return upwards of eighty Catholic members, and the English boroughs twenty more, thus forming a compact confederacy of 100 members, banded together for the subversion of all our institutions in church and state. He was answered eloquently, and in a liberal spirit, by Mr. Grattan, in the first speech addressed by him to the Imperial Parliament. The general discussion, however, was not distinguished, on either side, by much novelty. 6 The speech of Mr. Pitt serves as a land-mark, denoting the position of the question at that time. He frankly admitted that he retained his opinion, formed at the time of the Union, that Catholics might be admitted to the united Parliament, ‘under proper guards and conditions,' without any danger to the established church or the Protestant constitution.' But the circumstances which had then prevented him from proposing such a measure 'had made so deep, so lasting an impression upon his mind, that so long as those circumstances continued to operate, he should feel it a duty imposed upon him, not only not to bring forward, but not in any inanner to be a party in bringing forward, or in agitating this question.' At the same time, he de 1 Hans. Deb., 1st Ser., iv. 834-854. |