he lived to witness the smallest part of that system of deliberate outrage and intimidation, which has been adopted by the whole mass of Roman Catholics in Ireland, and, above all, by their Hierarchy and their Priesthood,—could he, I ask, be the advocate and patron of such a cause? Could he give the sanction of his honoured name to the demands of those who avowedly and exultingly proclaim their deadliest hate, their most active unmitigable hostility to the Church of Ireland, the Protestant Episcopal Church there established by law? Let Mr. Burke himself answer the question. He will tell us, even in his first letter to Sir H. Langrishe, that the Church is, by one of the most solemn acts of legislation, " declared to be fun"damental and essential for ever, in the Consti"tution of the United Kindom ;"* he will there tell us, that the King is bound by his Coronation Oath, to " do nothing to the prejudice "of the Church in favour of sectaries" of any kind, that the Church so to be protected by him, is the Church "established by law," and that, in order "to define it beyond all possi"bility of doubt, he swears to maintain the Bishops and Clergy, and the Churches 66 6 *Burke's Works, vol. iv. p. 562. "committed to their charge,' in their rights, present and future." 66 Mr. Burke knew nothing of that refined policy, which holds it illiberal and unwise, much less unjust, to exclude men from an equal share of civil privileges on account of their religious belief." In a Christian commonwealth," says he," the Church and the State are one and 66 66 the same thing, being integral parts of the "same whole."* "Dissent, not satisfied with toleration, is not conscience, but ambition." Again, "when gentlemen complain of the subscription," (pari ratione, of Tests) "as matter of grievance, the complaint arises from confounding private judgment, whose rights are "anterior to law, and the qualifications which "the law creates for its own magistracies, "civil or religious. To take away from men "their lives, their liberty, or their property, "those things for the protection of which society was introduced, is great hardship and "intolerable tyranny; but to annex any con"dition you please to benefits artificially created, "is the most just, natural, and proper thing in the "world."t 66 Still less did Mr. Burke assent to the frantic * Burke's Works, vol. v. p. 353. † Ibid. p. 332. theory of those who maintain, that religious opinions are altogether out of the province of civil government. "So far from Religion being "out of the province, or the duty, of a Christian magistrate," says he, "it is, and it ought to be, not only his care, but the principal thing "in his care, because it is one of the great bonds of human society; and its object the supreme good, the ultimate end and object "of man himself." As Religion is one of "the bonds of society, he ought not to suffer “it to be made the pretext of destroying its peace, "order, liberty, and its security. Above all, he 66 66 ought strictly to look to it, when men begin "to form new combinations, and especially, when they mingle a political system with their religious opinions, true or false, plausible or implausible." 66 66 Authority of Lord Bacon-Lord Coke- Such were the opinions of this great man. Not less strong was the judgment of those, who were the lights and ornament of elder times, men whom the wisest of every generation, till the present, were not ashamed to acknowledge as their teachers. Sir Francis Bacon says, "It is not possible, "in respect of the great sympathy between the state civil and the state ecclesiastical, to make "so much alteration in the Church, but that it "would have a perilous operation on the king"dom."* 66 66 And a greater authority even than Bacon, in a question of constitutional policy, Lord Coke, thus states "the matters of Parliament. 1. Touching the King. 2. The State of the Kingdome of England. 3. The Defence of the Kingdome. "4. The State of the Church. And this appear"eth by express words in the Parliament Writ in "these words: Pro quibusdam arduis urgentibus negotiis, nos, statum, et defensionem 66 6 6 regni nostri Angliæ et Ecclesiæ Anglicanæ "concernentibus, quoddam Parliamentum, 66 6 nostrum, &c. teneri ordinavimus.' And 66 though the State and Defence of the Church "of England be last named in the Writ, yet it “is first in intention, as it appeareth by the Title " of every Parliament. As for example, To the "honour of God and of holy Church, and the 66 6 quietness of the people.' 36 Edward III."+ There is another distinguished name which I am unwilling to omit, the rather, because his * Bacon's Works, (4to. Lond. 1730,) vol. iv. p. 436. + 4 Inst. 1. authority is often claimed in favour of the present demands of the Roman Catholics, for admission into Parliament, and into every department of the State,-I mean Sir William Blackstone. But surely none who has ever read what he has written on this point, can be mistaken as to his opinions. The concessions, which he favoured, were merely a relaxation of the ancient penal code-concessions made long ago, and in ampler measure, than he ever contemplated. The restrictions, which still remain, are those which he not only approved, but deemed essential to the safety of the State. We have already seen, that the declaration against Popery is treated by him as a necessary precaution to prevent "the extensive authority "which belongs to Parliament from falling into 66 66 improper hands;" and "the Test and Corpo"ration Acts, which secure both our civil and religious liberties," are numbered by him among those particulars which made "the reign of Charles II." (wicked, sanguinary, and turbulent as it was) " to be the era from which "we may date, not only the re-establishment "of our Church and Monarchy, but also the 66 |