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upon the various rebellions which broke out in Ireland between the Reformation, and the grand rebellion in the reign of Charles the First. The celebrated conquest of Ireland by Henry the Second, extended only to a very few counties in Leinster; nine tenths of the whole kingdom were left, as he found them, under the dominion of their native princes. The influence of example was as strong in this, as in most other instances; and great numbers of the English settlers who came over under various adventurers, resigned their pretensions to superior civilization, cast off their lower garments, and lapsed into the nudity and barbarism of the Irish. The limit which divided the possessions of the English settler from those of the native Irish, was called the pale; and the expressions of inhabitants within the pale, and without the pale, were the terms by which the two nations were distinguished. It is almost superfluous to state, that the most bloody and pernicious warfare was carried on upon the borders-sometimes for something-sometimes for nothing; most commonly for cows. The Irish, over whom the sovereigns of England affected a sort of nominal dominion, were entirely governed by their own laws; and so very little connexion had they with the justice of the invading country, that it was as lawful to kill an Irishman, as it was to kill a badger or a fox. The instances are innumerable, where the defendant has pleaded that the deceased was an Irishman, and that therefore defendant had a right to kill him ;—and, upon the proof of Hibernicism, acquittal followed of course.

When the English army mustered in any great strength, the Irish chieftains would do exterior homage to the English Crown; and they very frequently, by this artifice, averted from their country the miseries of invasion; but they remained completely unsubdued, till the rebellion which took place in the reign of Queen Elizabeth, of which that politic woman availed herself to the complete subjugation of Ireland. In speaking of the Irish about the reign of Elizabeth, or James the First, we must not draw our comparisons from England, but from New Zealand; they were not civilized men, but savages; and, if we reason about their conduct, we must reason of them as savages.

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After reading every account of Irish history,' (fays Mr Parnell) one great perplexity appears to remain: How does it happen, that from the firft invafion of the English till the reign of James I., Ireland feems not to have made the smalleft progrefs in civilization or wealth? • That it was divided into a number of fmall principalities, which waged conftant war on each other; or that the appointment of the chieftains was elective, do not appear fufficient reafons, although these are the only ones affigned by thofe who have been at the trouble of considering the fubject: neither are the confifcations of property quite fufficient to account for the effect. There have been great confifcations

in other countries, and ftill they have flourished: the petty ftates of Greece were quite analogous to the chiefries (as they were called) in Ireland; and yet they seemed to flourish almost in proportion to their diffenfions. Poland felt the bad effects of an elective monarchy more than any other country; and yet, in point of civilization, it maintained a very refpectable rank among the nations of Europe; but Ireland never, for an inftant, made any progrefs in improvement till the reign of James I.

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It is fcarcely credible, that in a climate like that of Ireland, and at a period fo far advanced in civilization as the end of Elizabeth's reign, the greater part of the natives fhould go naked. Yet this is rendered certain by the teftimony of an eye-witnefs, Fynes Moryfon. "In the remote parts, he fays, where the English laws and manners are unknown, the chief of the Irifh, as well men as women, go naked in the winter time, only having their privy parts covered with a rag of linen, and their bodies with a loose mantle. This I speak of my own experience; yet remember that a Bohemian Baron, coming out of Scotland to us by the north parts of the wild Irish, told me in great earnestness, that he, coming to the house of O'Kane, a great lord amongst them, was met at the door by fixteen women all naked, excepting their loofe mantles, whereof eight or ten were very fair; with which strange fight his eyes being dazzled, they led him into the house, and then fitting down by the fire with croffed legs, like tailors, and fo low as could not but offend chaite eyes, defired him to fit down with them. Soon after O'Kane, the lord of the country, came in all naked, except a loose mantle and fhoes, which he put off as soon as he came in; and entertaining the Baron after his best manner in the Latin tongue, defired him to put off his apparel, which he thought to be a burden to him, and to fit naked.

"To conclude, men and women at night going to fleep, lye thus naked in a round circle about the fire, with their feet towards it. They fold their heads and their upper parts in woollen mantles, first steeped in water to keep them warm; for they fay, that woollen cloth, wetted, preferves heat, (as linen, wetted, preferves cold), when the smoke of their bodies has warmed the woollen cloth. "

The cause of this extreme poverty, and of its long continuance, we muft conclude, arose from the peculiar laws of property, which were in force under the Irish dynasties. Thefe laws have been described by moft writers as fimilar to the Kentish custom of gavel-kind; and indeed fo little attention was paid to the subject, that were it not for the refearches of Sir J. Davis, the knowledge of this fingular ufage would have been entirely loft.

The Brehon law of property, he tells us, was fimilar to the custom (as the English lawyers term it) af hodge podge. When any one of the fept died, his lands did not defcend to his fons, but were divided among the whole fept; and, for this purpose, the chief of the fept made a new divifion of the whole lands belonging to the fept, and gave every

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one his part according to feniority. So that no man had a property which could defcend to his children; and even during his own life, his poffeffion of any particular fpot was quite uncertain, being liable to be conftantly fhuffled and changed by new partitions. The confequence of this was, that there was not a house of brick or ftone among the Irish, `down to the reign of Henry VII.; not even a garden or orchard, or well fenced or improved field, neither village or town, or in any refpe&t the leaft provifion for pofterity. This monftrous cuftom, fo oppofite to the natural feelings of mankind, was probably perpetuated by the policy of the chiefs. In the firft place, the power of partitioning being lodged in their hands, made them the most abfolute of tyrants, being the difpenfers of their property, as well as of the liberty of their fubjects. In the fecond place, it had the appearance of adding to the number of their favage armies; for, where there was no improvement or tillage, war was purfued as an occupation.

In the early history of Ireland, we find feveral instances of chieftains discountenancing tillage; and, fo late as Elizabeth's reign, Moryfon fays, that " Sir Neal Garve restrained his people from ploughing, that they might affift him to do any mischief. p. 98-102.

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These quotations and observations will enable us to state a few plain facts for the recollection of our English readers. 1st, Ireland was never subdued till the rebellion in the reign of Queen Elizabeth. 2d, For four hundred years before that period, the two nations had been almost constantly at war; and, in conse quence of this, a deep and irreconcileable hatred existed between the people within and without the pale. 3d, The Irish, at the accession of Queen Elizabeth, were unquestionably the most barbarous people in Europe. So much for what had happened previous to the reign of Queen Elizabeth: and let any man, who has the most superficial knowledge of human affairs, determine, whether national hatred, proceeding from such powerful causes, could possibly have been kept under by the defeat of one single rebellion; whether it would not have been easy to have foreseen, at that period, that a proud, brave, half savage people, would cherish the memory of their wrongs for centuries to come, and break forth into arms at every period when they were particu larly exasperated by oppression, or invited by opportunity. If the Protestant religion had spread in Ireland as it did in England; and if there never had been any difference of faith be tween the two countries, can it be believed that the Irish, ill treated, and infamously governed as they have been, would never have made any efforts to shake off the yoke of England? Surely there are causes enough to account for their impatience of that yoke, without endeavouring to inflame the zeal of ignorant people against the Catholic religion, and to make that mode of faith responsible for all the butchery which the Irish and English,

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English, for these last two centuries, have exercised upon each other. Every body, of course, must admit, that if to the causes of hatred already specified, there be added the additional cause of religious distinction, this last will give greater force (and what is of more consequence to observe, give a name) to the whole aggregate motive. But what Mr Parnell contends for is, and clearly and decisively proves is, that many of those sanguinary scenes attributed to the Catholic religion, are to be partly imputed to causes totally disconnected from religion; that the unjust invasion, and the tyrannical, infamous policy of the English, are to take their full share of blame with the sophisms and plots of Catholic priests. In the reign of Henry the Eighth, Mr Parnell shows, that feudal submission was readily paid to him by all the Irish chiefs; that the reformation was received without the slightest opposition; and that the troubles which took place at that period in Ireland, are to be entirely attributed to the ambition and injustice of Henry. In the reign of Queen Mary, there was no recrimination upon the Protestants ;-a striking proof, that the bigotry of the Catholic religion had not, at that peiod, risen to any great height in Ireland. The insurrections of the various Irish princes were as numerous during this reign as they had been in the two preceding reigns; a circumstance rather difficult of explanation, if, as is commonly believed, the Catholic religion was at that period the main spring of men's actions.

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In the reign of Elizabeth, the Catholic in the pale regularly fought against the Catholic out of the pale. O'Sullivan, a bigotted Papist, reproaches them with doing so. Speaking of the reign of James the First, (he says), And now the eyes even of the English Irish' (the Catholics of the pale) were opened, and they cursed their former folly for helping the heretic. The English Government were so sensible of the loyalty of the Irish English Catholics, that they entrusted them with the most confidential services. The Earl of Kildare was the principal instrument in waging war against the chieftains of Leix and Offal. William O'Bourge, another Catholic, was created Lord Castle Connel for his eminent services; and MacGullay Patrick, a priest, was the state spy. We presume that this wise and manly conduct of Queen Elizabeth was utterly unknown both to the Pastry-cook and the Secretary of State, who have published upon the dangers of employing Catholics even against foreign enemies; and in those publications have said a great deal about the wisdom of our ancestors, the usual topic whenever the folly of their descendants is to be defended. To whatever other of our ancestors they may allude, they may spare all compliments to this illustrious Princess, who would certainly have kept the worthy Confectioner to the composition

composition of tarts, and most probably furnished him with the productions of the Right Honourable Secretary, as the means of conveying those juicy delicacies to an hungry and discerning public.

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In the next two reigns, Mr Parnell shows by what injudicious measures of the English Government the spirit of Catholic opposition was gradually formed; for, that it did produce powerful effects at a subsequent period, he does not deny; but contends only, (as we have before stated), that these effects have been much overrated, and ascribed solely to the Catholic religion, when other causes have at least had an equal agency in bringing them about. He concludes with some general remarks on the dreadful state of Ireland, and the contemptible folly and bigotry of the English; remarks full of truth, of good sense, and of political courage. How melancholy to reflect, that there would be still some chance of saving England from the general wreck of empires, but that it may not be saved, because one politician will lose two thousand a year by it, and another three thousand, a third a place in reversion, and a fourth a pension for his aunt! Alas! these are the powerful causes which have always settled the destiny of great kingdoms, and which may level Old England, with all its boasted freedom, and boasted wisdom, to the dust. Nor is it the least singular among the political phenomena of the present day, that the sole consideration which seems to influence the unbigotted part of the English people, in this great question of Ireland, is a regard for the personal feelings of the Monarch. Nothing is said or thought of the enormous risk to which Ireland is exposed,nothing of the gross injustice with which the Catholics are treated,-nothing of the lucrative apostasy of those from whom they experience this treatment; but the only concern by which we all seem to be agitated is, that the King must not be vexed in his old age. We have a great respect for the King; and wish him all the happiness compatible with the happiness of his people; but these are not times to pay foolish compliments to Kings, or the sons of Kings, or to any body else: this Journal has always preserved its character for courage and honesty, and it shall do so to the last. If the people of this country are solely occupied in considering what is personally agreeable to the King, without considering what is for his permanent good, and for the safety of his dominions; if all public men, quitting the common vulgar scramble for emolument, do not concur in conciliating the people of Ire land; if the unfounded alarms, and the comparatively trifling interests

* It would be as well, in future, to fay no more of the revocation of the edict of Nantz.

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