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of population will follow; because parents, who are contented with their own condition, will feel no uneasiness for their offspring, who can, without any difficulty, procure a situation similar to their own. Emigration from such a country was not to be expected; for men whose modified wants were amply satisfied at home had no need to seek elsewhere for wealth they did not desire, or distinctions they did not value. Besides, Ireland has always had peculiar attractions in retaining her children: a Scotchman loves a Scotchman, but an Hibernian loves the green fields of his youth; and to enjoy these there are few privations to which he will not cheerfully submit. The eccentric humour, the boisterous mirth, the kind and social intercourse, that characterize the peasantry, likewise spread their charms, and generally succeeded in subduing the aspiring notions of adventurers, and helped to retain the people at home. When to these were added the allurements of a more tender kind, and when no restraint was placed on the natural instinct of man, we must not wonder that Ireland is blessed with a population without a parallel in Europe.

The base and cowardly conduct of the Irish proprietors in deserting the country, though at the moment a grievance, was absolutely productive of good. Their large domains were parcelled out to humble cottagers; farms were divided and subdivided; cabins everywhere raised their unostentatious roofs; and every floor was blessed with a numerous progeny.'

Ireland has been forced into agriculture; and this still further tends to increase the population, and to give her that political importance she never could have acquired if the people had been immured in mineral dungeons, or confined to the fetid vapours of a manufacturing bastille. Rural labour is not more conducive to the health of the body than it is beneficial to the exercise of the mind; and we always

find the agriculturist superior to the mechanic not only in physical strength, but in moral energy. The one is a natural soldier, who commands respect, and enacts consideration; while the other is a mere animated machine, whose ideas serve but as internal wheels to keep his hands in motion. His frame is distorted, his mind crippled, and his courage annihilated: but the agriculturist is a man such as Nature intended-fearless, active, and resolute; the air he breathes ensures him health; the ground he tills supplies him with sustenance; and his occupations make him moral, hardy, and brave. This is the copy of a million portraits, and they are all found in Ireland.

For this blessing we are indebted to our rulers, who forced us into agriculture; even our artisans are agriculturists; for every weaver, carpenter, and smith, through the country, have generally attached to their cottages a piece of ground, where they occasionally renovate their health in rural toil, and acquire that vigour which places them on a parallel with their rustic neighbours.'

And this state of things,' said I, I still further tends to increase your population, which, under present circumstances, must only be an amplification of misery.'

'But misery,' returned Emmet with a self-complaisant smile, is only endured where it cannot be obviated. The patient Samson, who, in his deprivation of strength, turned the mill for his oppressors, buried them in the. ruins of their temple when his powers were restored; and though Ireland, in her weakness, endured the badges of slavery, that is no reason she is calmly to submit when enabled to cast them off. The aspirations of civilized man after freedom are coeval with his existence. His rights, like the mountain torrent, may be diverted from their original channel, but cannot be effectually impeded in their course. Dams may be raised to stop

Agriculture. The mother and nurse of a military population. Ireland has been forced into this. It was thought that she had sunk under the arbitrary tyranny of British monopoly. Let the proud Briton regale himself in the wholesome air of mines, and workshops, and become ossified in the strengthening attitudes of monotonous labour; while the degraded Irishman draws health and number, and fierceness and force, and becomes too nimble to be caught by his crippled owner, who hobbles after him, and threatens with his crutch.'-CURRAN.

VOL. I.-No. 2.

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But we find,' said I, that very populous countries have continued in slavery.'

Numbers,' rejoined Emmet, whose minds are more enslaved than their bodies, may submit to injustice; but numbers inspired with intelligence never can. The Irish people are not only shrewd, but informed; and for this good, as well as for every other blessing they possess, they are indebted to the folly and wickedness of their governors. Divide et impera has long been the maxim of those who oppressed us; but the result has been the reverse of their anticipations. The continual agitation, faction, and discord, consequent upon such a system of legislation, produced their moral effects, and, like the vivid lightning, served to purify the element they disturbed. The political whirlpool has drawn within its vortex every man in Ireland; discussion has been universally provoked; and the passions have been enlisted in the general conflict. The human intellect has been propelled; vulgar errors corrected; and the spirit of inquiry and investigation has gone abroad.

To reason upon the political state of his country has long been the propensity of the Irish peasant; and, from continually thinking upon that subject, he has at length learned to think right. He not only knows his degraded condition, but is well acquainted with the cause. There is not a subject connected with the country on which he cannot give an accurate opinion; he knows as well as any man in the Castle the purpose of every measure of Government,* whether it

be to enrich a spendthrift nobleman by a job, or coerce the unfortunate peasantry by an Insurrection Act.

I know my countrymen; I have conversed with them, and have found them practical philosophers. Their sentiments are the pure emanations of acute minds, instructed in the school of Nature, and taught by adversity. They are, in consequence, generally correct, and, without any great exertion of thought, are frequently profound. How often have I seen them smile at the abortive efforts of their friends, who endeavour to procure them redress in a constitutional way, while, at the same time, they have told me very pertinently, and very truly, that they expected no concession from Government until they are able to insist on it!

Thus party spirit, however hurtful it has been in certain cases, has tended to bring the people to a correct knowledge of their rights; and, by keeping their country, and its grievances, continually before them, it has habituated them to the expectation of relief, and familiarized their minds to the only means of procuring it. The Government stands upon a mine, and that mine is publie opinion, and it requires only some pure spirit to apply the match, and blow to atoms the engines of corruption. The people have grown too cunning to be deceived, and too numerous to be despised. Temporary expedients-the resort of pusillanimity and weakness-will no longer avail. They know their rights, and wait but for an opportunity to assert them; they are acquainted with their strength, and wish for the moment to exert it.

The cause of man must ultimately triumph; for Ireland is arrived at that period beyond which she must cease to derive advantage from the blessings I have enumerated. A further increase of population will aug

* It may be asked, why I mention those things? The grand jury knows them very well;-but then they ought to be concealed. Miserable, infatuated notion! these things are not concealed; there is not a grand-jury job in the country which is not known and commented upon by the peasantry. Every mischief and every enormity I have this day stated is as thoroughly well known to the peasantry as to the gentry throughout Ireland. The affected apprehension of exciting and exasperating them, by a reprobation of these enormities, is puerile and contemptible. It cannot do mischief;-it cannot add to the poignancy of their feelings-it may allay or sooth them. Already thoseexactions are the subject of discussion, and of minute scrutiny, in every cabin.'— JUDGE FLETCHER'S Charge,

ment the local disturbances, and the measures Government must have recourse to for suppressing them will spread disaffection and discontent. Thus misery must be progressive; and, we all know, the cup, however capacious, that receives a continual stream, will at last overflow. Let Government pursue the usual system, and this event must be accelerated. Population, taxes, and poverty, will increase, until universal suffering produces among Irishmen a general disposition to rid themselves of the domination of England. Ireland can have no interest in supporting the powers that be;' for individuals are so poor that they can lose nothing from a change. The good of the people and the wishes of their rulers are beginning to diverge from each other, and circumstances must widen the separation.'

That is,' I interrupted, ⚫ unless Government conciliates.'

'Conciliation,' he repeated, is the writing on the wall, which they cannot understand, and they have no Daniel to interpret it for them.

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But, whether they conciliate or oppose, Ireland has directly benefitted by misgovernment; for numbers and intelligence have increased, and these, when united, and unencumbered with wealth, must be productive of freedom.'

During this dialogue Emmet's fine manly countenance glowed with an enthusiastic ardour, and he delivered himself with as much animated fervency as if he were addressing a numerous, but distracted assembly, which he wished to persuade. His words flowed with a graceful fluency, and he combined his arguments with all the ease of a man accustomed to abstract discussions.

The entrance of a stranger suspended our conversation, and, after a few minutes' private conference between Emmet and my cousin, the former took his leave, and Malachy and I set out for my uncle's residence. On our way I could not help admiring the delightful scenery on each side; but my pleasure was considerably damped by my companion's melancholy reflections. He admitted that the country

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I did not expect,' replied Malachy, to find in one, who apparently has the courage to think for himself, the advocate of an opinion, merely because it is general, when history and fact demonstrate its falsity. It is the gasconade of an arrogant sect, who, without a shadow of authority, have assumed to themselves a political superiority.'

*

Your zeal, my friend,' I replied, 'for your own religion, I fear, leads you to depreciate the merits of mine. It was the opinion of a great man that Catholicism was best adapted for monarchy, and Protestantism for a republic.'

The authority of a great name,' returned Malachy, however extensive its influence, has no power to make wrong right, or give to falsehood the consistency of truth. That amiable lawyer mistook, in this instance, as well as in many others, the effect for the cause; and has consequently paid a compliment where no compliment was due. A brief review of facts will convince you that the implied praise was unmerited; and that the Protestant religion has no advantage, in a political point of view, which the Catholic does not possess.

I shall hear you with pleasure,' said I, for I am always accessible to reason, and shall be glad to have an impression removed which I have frequently thought erroneous, and always wished to find so.'

We are all,' he replied, in some

* Montesquieu.

measure, slaves to prejudice; and, when I recollect how long I entertained the same opinion myself, I cannot hesitate to excuse such a belief in you. But, the moment I examined the merits of the case, I was astonished at my own stupidity in not having sooner detected the specious sophistry that so long imposed

on me.

Christianity-under which denomination we may include all those religions founded on revelation-the Protestant as well as others-is in its essence purely spiritual, and has for its object to prepare men for another world rather than to reform the institituons which make them miserable in this. It tends to create, in the minds of men, a contempt of terrene happiness, by promising them, on this condition, endless felicity hereafter. The world, and all it can bestow, whether it be the inflictions of tyranny or the advantages of freedom and justice, is below the apprehensions or the desires of a pure Christian. His life he considers as a state of probation, in which he cannot possibly be happy; for how can that mind be tranquil which is perpetually fixed on the future, a region divided between endless torments and never-ceasing felicity?

The first lesson he is taught, and which he hears continually repeated, is the shortness and uncertainty of this life; and he has no need of protracted years to be convinced that what he has learned is truth. To spend the period allotted him, and which a thousand incidents may shorten, in acts of piety and works of mercy, is a duty enjoined him by an unequivocal authority-which he dares not dispute, and which, if he rejects, he finds himself encountered by the condemnation of reason.

Such a man must be averse to

every thing which tends to disturb the Christian composure of his mind, or remotely risk that salvation to which his life is only preparatory. He considers it his duty to comply in all cases with established forms, when these do not militate against his spiritual interest; and in this he does no more than what sound philosophy will approve. As Christianity has not different doctrines for dif

ferent men, we must ever expect to find the followers of Christ the obedient subjects of all governments, from absolute despotism to pure republicanism; for submission to ex- isting authority is the characteristic of their faith. Thus we find that Christianity, however its professors may differ from each other, forms one of the ten thousand causes which prevent men from breaking down the barriers which tyranny and injustice have raised around them; and this influence is increased wherever it is directly or indirectly connected with temporal power.

'But, as Christians are men, human nature, however modified by institutions, can never be wholly eradicated. Man has rights, and his claim to these he has in all ages and in every country asserted. Men of all religions have thought, and thought justly, that political freedom and pure Christianity are not incompatible; and accordingly have oftentimes endeavoured to unite them. Perhaps they might have been more frequently successful had they not found that Christianity has a tendency-not in its principles, which are liberal beyond all other religions and all systems of philosophy, but in its very perfections, which are humane, and averse to the spilling of blood-to perpetuate the domination of the " powers that be," however oppressive these powers may have been'

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So far as your argument goes,' said I, it tends to confirm what you meant to disprove. Passive obedience may be found in that Church which attributes so many virtues to mortification; as those who behold, in every infliction, only the chastising hand of Providence, are adequately prepared to submit to tyranny. Such a people have sometimes called a famine, caused by their rulers, a visitation of Providence; but Protestantism, being freed from these errors, is incapable of such folly.'

'We should take care,' returned Malachy, not to charge Christianity with the errors of a barbarous age; nor blame it for not inculcating what it never proposed to teach. Political economy made no part of the doctrine of Christ; nor did he require

*

his followers, like the disciples of the Grecian sage, to be initiated in any science previous to their receiving his instructions. Men may be very pious, though very ignorant; and want of profane knowledge, where it was not wilful, I have never heard charged as a crime. An impartial examiner will discriminate, and not impute to the Catholic religion what it has always condemned-the errors of local superstition. Our Church boasts no supremacy of scientific knowledge; and it is not to be expected that the divines of the middle ages could be free from some of the universal errors which then overshadowed Europe.'

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'But,' said I, though we may excuse a man for being in darkness at midnight, there is no reason why he should keep his eyes obstinately closed when the sun has risen. He that refuses admission to truth, when all around are informed, may be said to obstruct the designs of Providence; and, if he does not merit execration, he ought not, at least, to expect any imitators. Why have not Catholic countries been as forward in improvement as those where Protestantism is professed? Surely the superiority of the latter is not without some assignable cause.'

That superiority,' replied Malachy, which Protestants once claimed, exists no longer; and even its early possession was owing to circumstances, and not to their religion. At the commencement of the reign of Henry VIII. Catholicism was in every part of Europe the religion of the state, interwoven with the constitution of every kingdom, and favoured by every power.

The Catholics displayed then the intolerant spirit of all privileged classes, and persecuted with an interested zeal, heightened by religious rancour, the new and innovating creed; while the reformers, like the Israelites of old, multiplied under the lash of persecution. Their numbers soon became formidable; for they

did not, at first, alarm men's consciences by impeaching any of the fundamental dogmas of the Church: they allowed her to be in possession of truth, but to have admitted certain abuses which required to be eradicated; that the temple was holy, though defiled; and that, when the cobwebs of superstition were brushed away, all might enter again without fear of pollution.

The lower ranks, who are necessarily the most moral, had long been scandalized at the conduct of the higher orders, as well as at the indolent and indecent luxury of the beneficed clergy, and eagerly listened to those who promised to reform the abuses which Religion had fallen into by her union with temporal power. But the Church by law established manifested the folly of those who neglect the simple remedy because they can use the wrong one. Persecution followed persecution, until those who were originally only reformers became separatists, who carried with them, into their new conventicles, that resentment they must have naturally felt against their implacable enemies; and, as these were Catholics and kings, popery and monarchy became the objects of their unappeased hatred.

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Their zeal became enthusiasm, and their piety fortitude. Like a stag at bay, their courage was inspired by despair, and all their proceedings originated in necessity. Religion and politics were blended in all their controversies; and for a short time they evinced a love of liberty that was then novel. But, as they had every thing to apprehend from existing governments, there is little wonder they found fault with kings, and wished to change a system under which they could not safely exist.

This love of independence was awakened in them as men, and not inculcated by their religion; for persecution, and not Protestantism, made men republicans.

**Let no one enter here ignorant of geometry' was the well-known inscription over the door of Plato's academy.

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Under the Papacy,' says Luther, in his book against Anabaptists,

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are many

good Christian things, yea, all that is good in Christianity, and that Protestants had, if from thence. I say, moreover,' says he, that under Papacy is true Christianity, even the very k rnel of Christianity.'

Cuvier.

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