tracted, bonâ fide, for valuable consideration, before the enrolment of such certificate, and thereupon to make such order for the support and maintenance of such Protestant child or children, by the distribution of the said real and personal estate, to and among such Protestant child or children, for the present support of such Protestant child or children; and also to and for the portion or portions, and future maintenance or maintenances, of such Protestant child, or children, after the decease of such Popish parent or parents, as the said court shall judge fit." The 12th clause provides, that all converts in public employments, members of parliament, barristers, attorneys, or officers of any courts of law, shall educate their children Protestants. By the 14th clause, the Popish wife of a Papist, having power to make a jointure, conforming, shall, if she survives her husband, have such provision, not exceeding the power of her husband, to make a jointure, as the Chancellor shall adjudge. By the 15th clause, the Popish wife of a Papist, not being otherwise provided for, conforming, shall have a proportion out of his chattels, notwithstanding any will or voluntary disposition, and the stat. 7th W. III. 6. The 16th clause provides, that a Papist teaching school publicly, or in a private house, or as usher to a Protestant, shall be deemed and prosecuted as a Popish regular convict. The 18th clause provides, that Popish priests, who shall be converted, shall receive 30l. per annum, to be levied and paid by Grand Juries. The 20th clause provides, whimsically enough, for the reward of discovering Popish clergy and schoolmasters, viz. For discovering an archbishop, bishop, vicar-general, or other person exercising any foreign ecclesias- For discovering each regular clergyman, and each se- £50 0 0 £20 0 0 10 0 0 For discovering each Popish schoolmaster or usher - of 18 years of age, and if he shall refuse to give testimony where and when he heard mass celebrated, and who and what persons were present at the celebration of it, and likewise touching the residence and abode of any priest or Popish schoolmaster to commit him to jail, without bail, for 12 months, or until he shall 201. pay By the 25th clause, no priest can officiate except in the parish for which he is registered, by 2d Anne, c. 7. The 30th clause provides for the discovery of all trusts agreed to be undertaken in favor of Papists; and enables any Protestant VOL. XX. Pam. NO. XL. 2 E to file a bill in Chancery against any person concerned in any sale, lease, mortgage, or incumbrance, in trust for Papists, and to compel him to discover the same; and it further provides, that all issues to be tried in any action founded upon this act, shall be tried by none but known Protestants. The 37th clause provides, that no Papist in trade, except in the linen trade, shall take more than two apprentices. The following are the other acts passed in this reign concerning the Catholics. An act to prevent Popish clergy from coming into the kingdom.' An act for registering Popish clergy. By which all the Catholic clergy then in the kingdom were required to give in their names and places of abode at the next quarter sessions: by this act they are prohibited from employing curates.' An act to amend this act.3 3 An act to explain and amend an act to prevent Papists being solicitors or sheriffs, &c.+ Clauses are introduced into this act, by which Catholics are prevented from serving on Grand Juries; and by which, in trials upon any statute for strengthening the Protestant interest, the plaintiff might challenge a Papist, which challenge the judge was to allow. During all Queen Anne's reign, the inferior civil officers, by order of Government, were incessantly harassing the Catholics, with oaths, imprisonments, and forfeitures, without any visible cause but hatred of their religious profession. In the year 1708, on the bare rumor of an intended invasion of Scotland by the Pretender, forty-one Roman Catholic noblemen and gentlemen were imprisoned in the castle of Dublin; and, when they were afterwards set at liberty, the Government was so sensible of the wrong done to them, that it remitted their fees, amounting to 8001. A custom that had existed from time immemorial, for infirm men, women, and children, to make a pilgrimage every summer to a place called St. John's well, in the county of Meath, in hopes of obtaining relief from their several disorders, by performing at it certain acts of penance and devotion, was deemed an object worthy of the serious consideration of the House of Commons; who accordingly passed a vote, that these sickly devotees "were assembled in that place to the great hazard and danger of the public peace, and safety of the kingdom." They also passed a vote, on the 17th March, 1705, "That all magistrates and other persons whatsoever, who 3 4th Anne, c. 2. 12d Anne, c. 3. 2 2d Anne, c. 7. 6th Anne, c. 1. See also 6 Anne, c. 16. §. 6. and 8 Anne, c. 3. §. 26. concerning Priests marrying Protestants. neglected or omitted to put them (the penal laws) in due execution, were betrayers of the liberties of the kingdom;" and in June, 1705, they resolved, "That the saying and hearing of mass, by persons who had not taken the oath of abjuration, tended to advance the interest of the Pretender; and that such judges and magistrates as wilfully neglected to make diligent inquiry into, and to discover such wicked practices, ought to be looked upon as enemies to her Majesty's Government." And, upon another occasion, they resolved, "That the prosecuting and informing against Papists was an honorable service to the Government.”3 GEORGE I. The following acts of Parliament were passed in this reign, for the purpose of strengthening the system which had been adopted by William and Anne, for preventing the growth of Popery. An act to make the militia of this kingdom more useful.4 By the 11th and 12th clauses of this act, the horses of Papists may be seized for the militia. By the 4th and 18th clauses, Papists are to pay double towards raising the militia. By the 16th clause, Popish house-keepers in a city, are to find fit Protestant substitutes. An act to restrain Papists from being high or petty constables, and for the better regulating the parish watches.5 An act for the more effectual preventing fraudulent conveyances, in order to multiply votes for electing members to serve in Parliament, &c.6 By the 7th clause of this act, no Papist can vote at an election, unless he takes the oaths of allegiance and abjuration. An act for the better regulating the town of Galway, and for strengthening the Protestant interest therein." An act for the better regulating the corporation of the city of Kilkenny, and strengthening the Protestant interest therein. An act by which Papists resident in towns, who shall not provide a Protestant watchman to watch in their room, shall be subject to certain penalties." By the 12th Geo. I. c. 9. §. 7. No Papist can vote at any vestry held for the purpose of levying or assessing money for rebuilding and repairing parish churches. 1 Com. Jour. 3. 289. 2 Ib. 319. 3 Ib. 319. 4 2d G. 1. c. 9. 8 4th Geo. I. c. 16. 2d G. I. c. 10.-This act expired in three years, and was not renewed. 7 4th Geo. I. c. 15. 6 2d Geo. I. c. 19. 9 6th Geo. I. c. 10. These acts of Parliament originated in the same spirit of persecution, which disgraced the reigns of William and Anne, and were, like the penal laws against the Catholics of those reigns, palpable violations of the treaty of Limerick. Though a glimmering of toleration had found its way into the councils of England, and given rise to "an act for exempting Protestant dissenters of this Country (Ireland) from certain penalties to which they were subject," the Catholics were excluded, by a particular clause, from any benefit of it. And though it was in this reign that the first act1 passed "for discharging all persons in offices and employments from all penalties which they had incurred by not qualifying themselves, pursuant to an act to prevent the further growth of Popery," the favor conferred by it was wholly to the Protestant dissenters, as no Catholic had been placed in any public office since the passing of that penal law. The loyalty of the Catholics was in this reign put to a complete trial, by the Scotch rebellion of 1715. If, after having fought three campaigns in support of James's pretensions to the throne of Ireland; after having experienced the infraction of every part of the treaty of Limerick, and been exposed to a code of statutes, by which they were totally excluded from the privileges of the constitution; and if, after they had become subject to the worst of all oppressions, the persecution of private society and private manners," they had embarked in the cause of the invader, their conduct would have been that of a high spirited nation, goaded into a state of desperation by their relentless tormentors, and if their resistance had been successful, their leaders would have ranked among the Tells and Washingtons of modern history.-But so far from yielding to the natural dictates of revenge, or attempting to take advantage of what was passing in Scotland to regain their rights, they did not follow the example of their rulers, in violating, upon the first favorable opportunity, a sacred and solemn compact; and thus they gave the strongest testimony, that they had wholly given up their former hopes of establishing a Catholic prince upon the throne. Their loyalty was not, however, a protection to them against the oppressions of their Protestant countrymen. The penalties for the exercise of their religion, were generally and rigidly inflicted. Their chapels were shut up, their priests dragged from their hiding-places, hurried into prisons, and from thence sent into banishment. 16th Geo. I. c. 9. 2 Burke's Letter to a Peer of Ireland. GEORGE II. In this reign, the following additional disabilities were imposed the Catholics. upon By the 1st G. II. c. 9. sect. 7. no Papist can vote at an election without taking the oath of supremacy. However great the oppression which the Catholics had experienced during former reigns, this measure altogether completed their entire exclusion from the benefits of the Constitution, and from the opportunity of regaining their former just rights. It was because this privilege had begun to operate amongst Protestants in a manner very favorable to the Catholics, and to bring about a feeling of regret for their sufferings, and a coalition between the two parties to oppose the influence of the English Government as a common cause of grievances, that Primate Boulter advised the Ministers to pass this law. His principle of government for Ireland, was to uphold the English interest by the divisions of the inhabitants; and, on this occasion, it induced him to adopt the desperate resolution of disfranchising, at one stroke, above five-sixths of its population.' By the first clause of 1st Geo. II. c. 30. barristers, six clerks, &c. are required to take the oath of supremacy. By the second clause all converts, &c. are bound to educate their children as Protestants. By 7th Geo. II. c. 5. sect. 12. barristers or solicitors, marrying Papists, are deemed Papists, and made subject to all penalties as such. By 7th Geo. II. c. 6. no convert can act as a justice of the peace, whose wife, or children, under 16 years of age, are educated Papists. The 13th Geo. II. c. 6. is an act to amend former acts for disarming Papists. By the 6th clause of this act, Protestants educating their children as Papists, are made subject to the same disabilities as Papists are. By 9th Geo. II. c. 3. no person can serve on a petty jury, unless seized of a freehold of 5l. per annum, or, being a Protestant, unless possessed of a profit rent of 157. per annum under a lease for years. By 9th Geo. II. c. 6. sect. 5. persons robbed by privateers, during war with a Popish prince, shall be reimbursed by grand jury pre Primate Boulter, in his Letter of this year to the Archbishop of Canterbury (1st. vol. p. 210.) says, "There are, probably, in this kingdom, five Papists, at least, to one Protestant." |