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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A77352	A discourse concerning Ireland and the different interests thereof, in answer to the Exon and Barnstaple petitions shewing, that if a law were enacted to prevent the exportation of woollen-manufactures from Ireland to foreign parts, what the consequences thereof would be both to England and Ireland.	Brewster, Francis, Sir, d. 1704.	1698 (1698)	Wing B4433; ESTC R232233	49,829	76

which time Seventeen Kings and Two Queens governed successively in England for which Reasons they conclude that it must of necessity have cost the English Nation vast Numbers of Men and great Sums of Money to keep their Ground which they gained there from time to time and at length to bring that whole Kingdom under subjection to the Crown of England And running away with this as an undoubted Maxim and Truth they conclude That it had been much better for England that God had left Ireland out of the Book of the Creation or placed it in some distant Corner of the World But this Conclusion will fail of course when I shew the mistake of the foregoing Opinion which will be the easiest thing imaginable to do if they will allow their own Chronicles and the Writings of their most Authentic English Historians to be the Rule of our Belief concerning the manner and means of Ireland's being Conquered by England For which end I here intended to have inserted a brief Abstract of English History so far as it relates to Ireland from the Reign of King Henry II. to the Conclusion of the late War but I find this in a great measure done to my hand by one Mr. W. H. in his Book entitled Remarks on the Affairs and Trade of England and Ireland printed for Tho. Parkhurst at the Bible and Three Crowns in Cheapside near Mercers-Chappel 1691. to which I refer such as think it worth their while to be satisfied more at large And therefore I shall only desire those who think Ireland to have cost England so dear to consult the Histories which are written concerning that Kingdom by their own Authors and they will find that the first Number of Men sent over by Strongbow Earl of Chepstow and Pembroke under the Command of Fitz-Stephens and Fitz-Gerrald was but 400. which were followed soon after by Legross with 130. and in three Months after by Strongbow himself with 1200. more being in August 1170. the whole three Numbers amounting but to 1730. which was the Complement of the Army that by the Assistance of Mac Murragh King of Leinster and his Friends did not only recover that King's Dominions in Leinster but very much enlarge them and in effect made the Kings of England Lords of Ireland and all this was done at the private Expence of Strongbow and his Friends as the remaining Provinces of that Kingdom were most if not all of them subjected to the Crown of England at the Expence of particular Persons who notwithstanding were well rewarded for their Services by the grants of those vast Estates which were given them by the Kings of England and which many of their Successors enjoy to this Day 'T is true that King Henry III. in the Year 1172. landed there in Person with a Party which some say consisted of 4500. but others only of 500 Knights but had no occasion to make use of them for upon his arrival the Natives of the three Provinces of Leinster Munster and Connaught were so terrified that five of their Kings became tributary to him by which means he did not only cut off the Communication which France held with Ireland theretofore from whence they had considerable Succours whenever the English waged War against them but he had himself in four Years after a very considerable Subsidy out of that Kingdom His Successors also had frequently great Aids of Men Money and Provisions from thence which were great Assistances to the English in their several Wars against the French Scotch and Welch all which is owned by the most Authentic English Historians that have written upon this Subject And 't is certain that they make it plainly appear that the People of England from their first entrance into Ireland for 400 Years which reached to the middle of Queen Elizabeth's Reign were considerable gainers by that Kingdom and that there were greater Numbers of Men and more Money and Provisions sent from thence into England France c. in the several Kings Reigns that govern'd during those Years who were generally involved either in Civil Wars in the Heart of England or in Foreign Wars against the French Scotch or Welch than were sent out of England all that time towards the Reduction or Conquest of Ireland For tho' there were frequent Rebellions raised in Ireland before the Reign of Queen Elizabeth yet they were generally quash'd by the English of that Country and such of the Irish as adhe●ed to them with very little Cost to England till that grand Rebellion which was raised by Tyrone and others who were set on and encouraged by the Pope who by his publick Bull excommunicated Queen Elizabeth and the Kingdom of England and were assisted with Men and Money by the Spaniard For till the Pope's Supremacy was invaded and Religion reformed most of the Irish except the Grandees of them that lost their Estates by Conquest at first or by Rebellion after they had submitted to the Crown of England with their particular Friends and Adherents most of the rest I say were well enough satisfied with the English Government under which they lived much more securely and happily than they did under their own Petty Kings who were daily Killing and Robbing and using all manner of Acts of Hostility towards each other But the Pope being disobliged the Quarrel ceased to be as formerly between English and Irish on account of Civil Interest and was taken up between Protestant and Papist on account of Religion for the English Papists joyned with the Irish as did some Irish Protestants with the English on the other hand and the Papists of both kinds became Enemies to the Crown of England by the instigation of their Priests and Friars as we must expect they will ever remain while those Incendiaries are suffered to continue amongst them And the Truth of the Matter is that the antient Irish being a poor dispirited and cowardly People that is the generality of them they would in all probability run with as much dread from the English as the Spartan Slaves did from their Masters to their several Imployments when they appeared with no Arms but Whips in their Hands were they not assisted and managed by the degenerate English Papists who are the most desperate and troublesome Enemies the Protestants have in that Nation For the Proof of which we need not look further back than the late Rebellion for the Chief among the very first that began about Christmas 1688. to drive away the Protestants Cattel in the Counties of Mayo and Galway in the Province of Connaught where the Rappareeing Trade began were of antient degenerate English Families such as the Jordans Stanfords Joyces Garvys and several others whose Predecessors were antiently transplanted thither from England And as for the Army which was raised there for the late King James it could never have been brought to be any way considerable had none joyned in it but the antient Irish We know that Tyrconnel and Sarsfield

Foreign Plantations as those of Newfoundland in particular whose Case is not very unlike to ours the French not long ago invaded those Coasts landed a Party of Soldiers there who committed all manner of Hostilities where-ever they came took one or more of their Fortifications and reduced the Inhabitants who are Subjects of England to a most wretched and lamentable Condition insomuch that some hundreds of them were forced to fly for Refuge into other Countries or Plantations And to redress these Injuries England thought convenient to fit out a Squadron of Ships with some Regiments of Land-Forces which were sent upon that Expedition not without a considerable Expence to the Nation Now this Expedition being over and those poor People being settled in their former Habitations begin to follow their respective Imployments and retrieve some part of the great Losses which they sustained by the Enemy should England now take up a prejudice against them give them the denomination of Americans or Indians and impose such severe Rules or Laws upon them in respect to their Trade or Commerce that such of them as could live elsewhere must quit that Country and such other poor People as could not so easily remove from thence must be reduced to so miserable and low a Condition that they must lie obnoxious to the cruelties and fury of the neighbouring Indians or any other Enemy that should think fit to attack them this would in all probability bring England in some few Years under the necessity either of quitting their Pretensions to that Colony or sending another Fleet and Army to regain it and would rather be thought Cruelty or Infatuation than Prudence or good Management And yet I know not how it comes to be thought otherwise in reference to Ireland which is esteemed by all the wise Men of England as much more necessary and precious than Newfoundland or any other Plantation or Colony of that kind as their Gold and Silver is in comparison to their Half-pence and Farthings And if they rightly consider the matter they cannot but conclude that the English of Ireland let them call us Irish-men or what they please are a body of Men which next to themselves in Great Britain they ought to love and value more than any People under Heaven since we are Flesh of their Flesh and Bone of their Bone and there is so natural and intimate a Relation and Connexion between them and us that we are always ready to stand or fall to be happy or miserable with them It would be thought very unnatural and barbarous were there any one so mad as to be guilty of such a thing that a Man should be angry with his Hand or Foot and should therefore use means to prevent the Circulation of the Blood and stop the Passage of the common Nutriment of the Body into that part this would in all human probability cause such violent Distempers in the Body as might occasion the Stagnation of the whole Mass of Blood and the Dissolution of the Body And this is certainly in a politick Sense the Case of England and Ireland If it be necessary for the Security and well being of this Nation that the Soveraignty of Ireland should still be continued to the Kings of England and yet that the People of England will rather choose to ruin the intire Interests of their Friends in that Country than suffer them to turn the most beneficial Productions thereof to their Advantage it may in some time prove very prejudicial if not fatal to the People of England themselves which will further appear from the more than probable if not the necessary Consequences of such a Statute which I shall endeavour as briefly and plainly as I can to offer to the Consideration of such as will vouchsafe to peruse this Paper And 1. The first and immediate Consequence that must necessarily follow the promulgation of such a Law will be the unavoidable Ruin of those many Thousands of English Families who live by the Woollen Manufactures in Ireland and in which the Strength of the English Interest in that Kingdom doth in a great measure consist when their Trades are rendred useless to them and they are incapacitated of earning their Bread thereby they must at least the greater part of them remove themselves and their Families into some other part of the World where they may hope for a livelihood for in Ireland 't will be morally impossible they should have it since Tradesmen of this kind are generally Strangers to all Callings except those in which they were educated To England great part of them dare no more venture than those who since last Session of Parliament transplanted themselves from the Fryars and other priviledged Places and tho' 't is not to be believed that the Parliament of England would deliberately and wilfully do any thing that may lessen the number of the English and weaken their own Interest in Ireland yet if we should suppose that they should enact such Laws for the Encouragement of those Tradesmen by which their Creditors in England must be very easy to them or indeed forgive them their whole Debts even this would not prove a sufficient motive to them for returning into England for if they could not live here in the beginning of their time much less will they be now able to subsist by what they shall earn having been accustomed to the exuberant Plenty and Cheapness of Ireland and having generally very numerous Families that Country being remarkably fruitful for the procreation of Children If they should remove to Scotland as 't is not unlikely many of them would upon such an occasion that Country being much cheaper than England and it being not improbable that there would be great Encouragements proposed to them there they must in all probability imbody with the Scotch and become one People with them in relation both to their Religion and Civil Interests for we know by woful Experience that Men of those ordinary Capacities are but too prone and easy to be drawn away from the antient established Church of these Nations especially when they can propose to themselves any temporal Advantages thereby and by this means the People of Scotland with their Correspondents and Friends in Ireland both their Interests being inseparable will not only be the easier and cheaper furnished with Woollen Manufactures to carry on their East-India Trade but will be capacitated to Trade to the West-Indies also and that notwithstanding the Restriction laid or to be laid upon them by England that they should not carry any Commodities to the Western Plantations except Servants and Provisions which is all the People of Ireland are allowed to transport into that part of the World they will I say by this means be in a great measure enabled to carry on a Trade to America that is if what they have lately said in the Case of the Royal-Fishery be allowed them that being a free unconquered People no Laws can affect them

Harbours capable of receiving Ships in the most desart and mountainous Maritim parts of that Country from whence it will not lie in the power of Man to hinder their conveying of what Commodities they shall think convenient to any Country where they may expect a kind Reception But it may perhaps be here objected that the English of that Kingdom are concern'd in this Owling Trade as well as others To which I must answer That if there be some few particular Persons that have either married the Daughters or learn'd the Manners of the People of the Land who have been thus guilty 't is not my business to justifie them But the English of Ireland in general are Men of greater Loyalty Conscience and Honesty than for private gain to do any thing that may be a wrong to their King and opposite to the publick good of their Country the truth of which will abundantly appear to any one that considers the strict and severe Laws they have made in relation to this particular And indeed there are but very few English Dealers in the Sea-Ports of that Kingdom where these Cheats are generally practised for besides the under-hand Contrivances that have been frequently made use of to ruin any English-man that sets up a Trade there the adjacent parts of the Country are mostly inhabited by People that will not deal with any English man for any thing they can be furnish'd with by those of their own Country or Profession and if the Irish be suffered again to go on with this VVool-Trade of which the English of that Country's being prohibited to go on with their Manufactures would in a great measure hinder them it will be a great means of enabling them to come in for a snack of the Estates of the English there For Secondly Another Consequence of that Law if enacted will be the Ruin of the English Gentlemen and Farmers who as I have already said are the principal if not the only considerable Flock-masters of that Kingdom For if the Manufactures be discouraged and run down and the Manufacturers forced to leave the Country the prices of Wool must fall of course and consequently the value of Sheep also The Farmers whose principal Substance has always consisted in that kind of Cattel will not be able to pay their Rents and in their own defence must throw up their Leases to their Landlords who by this means must needs be fellow-sufferers with them and will neither be well able nor indeed willing to hold their Estates in that Kingdom which will not seem a Paradox if we consider That the English of that Country are the only sufferers by the late War many of them that had Estates or a Title to Estates which was the most they had in those miserable Times raised considerable Sums of Money among their Friends in England to equip them for the Army or put them in a condition of returning into their own Country Others who owed Debts before were by the loss of their Estates both real and personal and the great Interest of Money in that Kingdom rendered uncapable of paying off those Debts which are the true Causes that so many of the English Estates there are this day so deeply encumber'd 'T is not good Manners to name Noblemen and Gentlemen upon this occasion but this is certainly the Condition of many of the English Landlords in Ireland from the highest Rank to the lowest and the great means which many of them proposed for the recovery of their losses and their future security were the raising of Flocks and the encouragement of the Woollen Manufactures towards which ends not a few of them have laid out great part of what Money they could procure after the War in Sheep and have given great encouragements to Tradesmen of all kinds who are fit for that purpose by letting them convenient Lands at easie Rates and building them Work-houses some at their own private expence and others at the publick charge even in the remotest and most Irish Counties of that Kingdom with an intent to plant English Colonies that may be able to secure themselves and snub the Irish whenever they shall perceive them begin to grow high and insolent And if this Law pass that Charitable as well as Useful Design must necessarily fall to the ground and end in the inevitable ruin of those English Manufacturers and Farmers and the great detriment of the Landlords the last of which will many of them be forced to Sell or Mortgage their Estates to satisfie their Creditors Or let us suppose as 't is but reasonable we should that many of the English Gentlemen of Ireland have been better Husbands than others and have not only good Estates in Lands but have Money by them so that the loss of their Flocks cannot be of such very ill consequence to them but that they may live plentifully without them either by Tenanting their Lands with the vulgar Irish or by dealing in other Stock such as Black Cattel Horses c. And let us suppose that those other Gentlemen whose Fortunes are encumbered should by being good Husbands or living poorly have a prospect of getting over those difficulties and clearing their Estates in some Years Yet if the English Interest be run down and their Numbers so lessened as by this Law they must needs be neither the one nor the other will think it safe to continue in a Country where they have themselves so lately and their Ancestors so often heretofore been sufferers but will rather choose to dispose of their Estates there and purchase some small Concerns where they may live with some security and partake of the Privileges of English men or Free Subjects from which a Law of this kind must undeniably exclude them Now the Purchasers of those Lands must be either the Irish or the Scotch or most probably they will both be Sharers if the Irish get a considerable part of them they will in a few Years be in a condition of affording large assistance to any Foreign Prince or pretended Popish-Heir that may endeavour to disturb the Peace and Tranquility of these Kingdoms But 't is likely the Scotch will be the greater Purchasers and by that means grow Rich and Formidable and able to stand by England with their Lives and Fortunes against all that shall oppose them And to be the same easie and neighbourly People that they have been from the time of the ancient Picts when Mr. Cambden tells us their Friends in Scotland began to make frequent Visits into England down to our own Times But lest I should seem to design this as an Invective and to incense England against them and withal to be as Impertinent as we should suppose a Stranger to have been that should have come into the City of Jerusalem in her prosperity and told that People a Story out of their own Chronicles how vexatious the Gentiles in their neighbouring Countries had been to them for many Ages I shall therefore