The Letter to Lord Milton is very well and very pleasantly written. We are delighted with the liberality and candour of the Archbishop of Cashel. The charge is in the highest degree creditable to him. He must lay his account for the furious hatred of bigots, and the incessant gnawing of rats.

6

There are many men who (thoroughly aware that the Catholic question must be ultimately carried) delay their acquiescence till the last moment, and wait till the moment of peril and civil war before they yield. That this moment is not quite so remote as was supposed a twelvemonth since, the events now passing in the world seem to afford the strongest proof. The truth is, that the disaffected state of Ireland is a standing premium for war with every cabinet in Europe which has the most distant intention of quarrelling with this country for any other cause. If we are to go to war, let us do so when the discontents of Ireland are at their greatest height, before any spirit of concession has been shown by the British Cabinet.' Does any man imagine that so plain and obvious a principle has not been repeatedly urged on the French Cabinet?-that the eyes of the Americans are shut upon the state of Ireland-and that that great and ambitious Republic will not, in case of war, aim a deadly blow at this most sensitive part of the British empire? We should really say, that England has fully as much to fear from Irish fraternisation with America as with France. The language is the same; the Americans have preceded them in the struggle; the number of emigrant and rebel Irish is very great in America; and all parties are sure of perfect toleration under the protection of America. We are astonished at the madness and folly of Englishmen, who do not perceive that both France and America are only waiting for a convenient opportunity to go to war with this country; and that one of the first blows aimed at our independence would be the invasion of Ireland.

We should like to argue this matter with a regular Tory Lord, whose members vote steadily against the Catholic question. 'I wonder that mere fear does not

make you give up the Catholic question! Do you mean to put this fine place in danger-the venison-the pictures the pheasants-the cellars-the hot-house and the grapery? Should you like to see six or seven thousand French or Americans landed in Ireland, and aided by a universal insurrection of the Catholics? Is it worth your while to run the risk of their success? What evil from the possible encroachment of Catholics, by civil exertions, can equal the danger of such a position as this? How can a man of your carriages, and horses, and hounds, think of putting your high fortune in such a predicament, and crying out, like a schoolboy or a chaplain, "Oh, we shall beat them! we shall put the rascals down!" No Popery, I admit to your Lordship, is a very convenient cry at an election, and has answered your end; but do not push the matter too far: to bring on a civil war, for No Popery, is a very foolish proceeding in a man who has two courses and a remove!

As you value your side-board of plate, your broad riband,

your pier glasses-if obsequious domestics and large rooms are dear to you-if you love ease and flattery, titles and coats of arms-if the labour of the French cook, the dedication of the expecting poet, can move you -if you hope for a long life of side-dishes-if you are not insensible to the periodical arrival of the turtle fleets-emancipate the Catholics! Do it for your ease, do it for your indolence, do it for your safety-emancipate and eat, emancipate and drink-emancipate, and preserve the rent-roll and the family estate!'

The most common excuse of the Great Shabby is, that the Catholics are their own enemies-that the violence of Mr. O'Connell and Mr. Shiel have ruined their cause -that, but for these boisterous courses, the question would have been carried before this time. The answer to this nonsense and baseness is, that the very reverse is the fact. The mild and the long-suffering may suffer for ever in this world. If the Catholics had stood with their hands before them simpering at the Earls of Liverpool and the Lords Bathurst of the moment, they would

thousand. As long as the patient will suffer, the cruel will kick. No treason-no rebellion-but as much stubbornness and stoutness as the law permits a thorough intimation that you know what is your due, and that you are determined to have it if you can lawfully get it. This is the conduct we recommend to the Irish. If they go on withholding, and forbearing, and hesitating whether this is the time for the discussion or that is the time, they will be laughed at for another century as foolsand kicked for another century as slaves. 'I must have my bill paid (says the sturdy and irritated tradesman); your master has put me off twenty times under different pretences. I know he is at home, and I will not quit the premises till I get the money.' Many a tradesman gets paid in this manner, who would soon smirk and smile himself into the Gazette, if he trusted to the promises of the great.

Can any thing be so utterly childish and foolish as to talk of the bad taste of the Catholic leaders?—as if, in a question of conferring on, or withholding important civil rights from seven millions of human beings, any thing could arrest the attention of a wise man but the good or evil consequences of so great a measure. Suppose Mr. S. does smell slightly of tobacco-admit Mr. L. to be occasionally stimulated by rum and waterallow that Mr. F. was unfeeling in speaking of the Duke of York-what has all this nonsense to do with the extinction of religious hatred and the pacification of Ireland? Give it if it is right, refuse it if it is wrong. How it is asked, or how it is given or refused, are less than the dust of the balance.

What is the real reason why a good honest Tory, living at ease on his possessions, is an enemy to Catholic Emancipation? He admits the Catholic of his own rank to be a gentleman, and not a bad subject and about theological disputes an excellent Tory never troubles his head. Of what importance is it to him whether an Irish Catholic or an Irish Protestant is a Judge in the King's Bench at Dublin? None; but I am afraid for the Church of Ireland, says our alarmist. Why do you

never live in?

care so much for the Church of Ireland, a country you Answer I do not care so much for the Church of Ireland, if I was sure the Church of England would not be destroyed. And is it for the Church of England alone that you fear? Answer Not quite to that, but I am afraid we should all be lost, that every thing would be overturned, and that I should lose my rank and my estate. Here then, we say, is a long series of dangers, which (if there were any chance of their ever taking place) would require half a century for their development; and the danger of losing Ireland by insurrection and invasion, which may happen in six months, is utterly overlooked, and forgotten. And if a foreign influence should ever be fairly established in Ireland, how many hours would the Irish Church, how many months would the English Church, live after such an event! How much is any English title worth after such an event any English family. any English estate? We are astonished that the brains of rich Englishmen do not fall down into their bellies in talking of the Catholic question-that they do not reason through the cardia and the pylorus-that all the organs of digestion do not become intellectual. The descendants of the proudest noblemen in England may become beggars in a foreign land from this disgraceful nonsense of the Catholic question fit only for the ancient females of a market town.

What alarms us in the state of England is the uncertain basis on which its prosperity is placed — and the prodigious mass of hatred which the English government continues, by its obstinate bigotry, to accumulate — eight hundred and forty millions sterling of debt. The revenue depending upon the demand for the shoes, stockings, and breeches of Europe — and seven millions of Catholics in a state of the greatest fury and exasperation. We persecute as if we did not owe a shilling we spend as if we had no disaffection. This, by possibility, may go on; but it is dangerous walking-the chance is, there will be a fall. No wise man should take such a course. All probabilities are against it. We are

astonished that Lord Hertford and Lord Lowther, shrewd and calculating Tories, do not see that it is nine to one against such a game.

It is not only the event of war we fear in the military struggle with Ireland; but the expense of war, and the expenses of the English government, are paving the way for future revolutions. The world never yet saw so extravagant a government as the Government of England. Not only is economy not practised—but it is despised; and the idea of it connected with disaffection, Jacobinism, and Joseph Hume. Every rock in the ocean where a cormorant can perch is occupied by our troops has a governor, deputy-governor, storekeeper, and deputystorekeeper and will soon have an archdeacon and a bishop. Military colleges, with thirty-four professors, educating seventeen ensigns per annum, being half an ensign for each professor, with every species of nonsense, athletic, sartorial, and plumigerous. A just and necessary war costs this country about one hundred pounds a minute; whipcord fifteen thousand pounds; red tape seven thousand pounds; lace for drummers and fifers, nineteen thousand pounds; a pension to one man who has broken his head at the Pole; to another who has shattered his leg at the Equator; subsidies to Persia; secret service-money to Thibet; an annuity to Lady Henry Somebody and her seven daughters the husband being shot at some place where we never ought to have had any soldiers at all; and the elder brother returning four members to Parliament. Such a scene of extravagance, corruption, and expense as must paralyse the industry, and mar the fortunes, of the most industrious, spirited people that ever existed.

Few men consider the historical view which will be taken of present events. The bubbles of last year; the fishing for half-crowns in Vigo Bay; the Milk Muffin and Crumpet Companies; the Apple, Pear, and Plum Associations; the National Gooseberry and Currant Company; will all be remembered as instances of that partial madness to which society is occasionally exposed. What will be said of all the intolerable trash which is