Kingdom but Kings had nothing to do with the managing of spiritual affairs but were to obey the Orders of the Church It is true King James highly resented this and the Preacher was banished or voluntarily withdrew from Court but in this he spake the general sense of the Clergy indeed of the Roman Church to which the King had given himself up and must be forced to submit to it at last The Kings Promises therefore or his Laws could signifie nothing towards the securing us except he could get the Roman Church to join in them and become a party to them for whilst the Governours of that Church challenge the whole management of spiritual things and King James owned their power so far that he consented to abolish the Oath of Supremacy that denies it for him to promise safety and liberty to Hereticks and make Laws about the worship of God and Liberty of Conscience is clearly according to their Doctrine to give away what is not his own and dispose the rights of another without consulting the party interessed and according to all Casuists such promises are void they that speak most favourably of the Council of Constance which is supposed to determine that no Faith is to be kept with Hereticks make this Apology for the Council The Emperor Sigismond granted without consulting the Council a safe conduct to Jerome of Prague the Council condemned him for Heresie and ordered him to be burnt the Emperor interpos'd to justifie his safe conduct but the Council answered that he was not obliged to make it good to the Heretick because it was not in the Emperor to grant a safe conduct to secure a Man against the Justice of the Council without consulting it this is the most favourable representation I have met with of this matter and even thus it is a sufficient caution for all Protestants not to trust Kings or Princes of the Roman Communion in matters that relate to the Church or Religion without the express consent of that Church or Religion without the express consent of that Church if they do it is at their own peril and they cannot blame those Princes when they fail in their Promises for they had sufficient warning not to trust them since they engage for a thing that according to their own confession is not in their power but is avowedly the right of another SECT III. The same proved from the Professions of that whole party who were most privy to King James's Counsels THE second Argument whence it appears that the King designed utterly to destroy and ruin his Protestant Subjects in Ireland is from the Oaths Professions and Affirmations of those who were his Confidents and Instruments used by him to bring it to pass From the very beginning of the French Persecution the Papists of Ireland began to shew their fondness of that Monarch and as their love to him commenced with that Persecution so it increased in proportion to his barbarity and they could never speak of it without Passion and Transport but after his late Majesty came to the Crown they openly declared that they liked no Government but that of France that they would make the King as absolute here as that King was there they affirmed both publickly and privately with many Oaths that they would in a short time have our Estates and Churches that if they suffered us to live they would make us hewers of wood and drawers of water that Ireland must be a Catholick Country whatever it cost and as for the English they would make them as poor devils as when they came first into Ireland and they assured us that this was no rash surmise of their own but that it was premeditated and resolved and that we should quickly find it by the effects of which they were so confident though we could not believe them that some of the most serious amongst them advised their Protestant Friends in private with all earnestness to change their Religion for said they you will be forced to do it at length and if you delay but a little time it will be too late and perhaps you may not be accepted for no Protestant must expect to injoy any thing in this Kingdom and we resolve to reduce all things to the state they were in under Henry VII before Poinings Act. In answer to this we told them that the Laws were on our side and the King had promised to Govern according to Law and to protect our Church and Liberties but they laught at our Credulity pisht at the Laws as mere Trifles and unanimously declared that the Kings Promises to maintain the Government in Church and State were intended only for England and were not meant to reach us and withal intimated that the same would be done in England though not so soon for the truth of all which I may refer my self to almost as many Protestants as were then in Ireland there being few but were Witnesses of such Discourses and the Kings Conduct towards us was such as left no room for us to doubt but that these People knew his mind and that all his Promises and Declarations in our favour were perfectly coppied from the French Kings Declarations to preserve the Edict of Nants and of as little Sincerity and that notwithstanding these he had as fully determined our ruin as that King had resolved the voiding the Edict of Nants when he made his solemn Declarations to the contrary SECT IV. The same destructive designs against his Subjects proved from the qualifications of the Officers employed by King James 1. THIS destructive design appears in the third place from the persons he Employed in all Offices of Trust or Power It is well known to the World and to many thousands yet alive that in the year 1641. there was a most bloody Massacre committed in this Kingdom on the Protestants by their Neighbours the Papists in which some hundred thousands perished and that not one Protestant whom they spared escaped without being robbed and plundered of all he had if not stripped and turned out naked to the extremities of Cold and a desolate Country and to such a degree of madness they proceeded that they destroyed the Houses Buildings Churches and Improvements of the Kingdom out of their malice and inveteracy to the Protestants the Founders of them but these Barbarians at last were by the Protestants subdued and brought to submit to mercy after which Conquest the Conquerors in the year 1660. joined indeed were more forward than the People of England in bringing home King Charles II. and generously gave up themselves together with the Kingdom of Ireland without Articles or Conditions into his hands The King in recompence of so signal a Service and to reprise the Conquerors for their Blood Treasure and Losses gave them back a part of what they had given him but withal restored the Conquered under certain qualifications to another part of the forfeited Lands who though restored by the Kings mere
two hot headed Fellows amongst them but they universally talked at this rate And it was the common and encouraging Speech of the Earl of Tyrconnel from the very beginning of his Government and particularly when he took leave of several Privy Councellors and Officers at his going to wait on King James at Chester August 1687 I have put the Sword into your Hands And then in his usual Stile prayed God to damn them all if ever they parted with it again 9. 'T is further to be remembred that their Predecessors were so eager and earnest to recover this Power over their Vassals and to establish their Religion that they attempted to gain their Designs by that bloody Rebellion and Massacre in the year 1641. An Attempt no less desperate and unlikely to succeed than wicked and when their own Power appeared insufficient to gain their ends their supreme Council at Killkenny sent Commissioners with Instructions to offer up the Kingdom and themselves to the Pope the King of Spain or any other Foreign Popish Prince that would accept the Offer This was very well known to King James he was at the Council-Board when the original Instructions signed by order of the Supreme Council that then managed the Affairs of the Roman Catholicks of Ireland were produced before King Charles II and his Council in England in the year 1662 empowering their Agents to this effect and he might very well conclude that they who were willing to submit themselves to a Foreign Power to be rid of the Laws of England would heartily join with him to destroy them 10. Whosoever will consider Circumstances and lay things together will be apt to believe what is averred by some that King James before he declared his Religion had a desire and resolution to destroy the Laws and Liberties of these Kingdoms and make himself absolute if ever he came to the Crown after the manner of France and that the great motive of declaring himself a Roman Catholick at first wàs to make sure of that Party there are several things that rightly weighed will make this probable 1. If we consider that no Party amongst us was likely to be so wicked as to have bought his favour by joining with him in such a design except the Papists 2. Amongst Papists he chose out those and preferred them which he thought would be most Cordial to him and serve him most effectually in that design There can be no other reason given why he should be fonder of the Irish than the English Papists but that he thought the one more likely to go through with him than the other The English Papists are as Zealous in their Religion as the Irish and generally more honest Men yet the King rather chose to Cherish and Employ the latter The only imaginable Reason of his doing so was because the English were not so ready to give up the Laws and Liberties of the Kingdom to the Prerogative as the Irish and since King James's kindness was distributed according to the readiness he found in Men to betray their Country rather than according to their Zeal for their Religion have we not reason to conclude the first to be the true motive of his kindness rather than the latter 3. Those Protestants or pretended Protestants that cordially and heartily espoused this design and served him effectually to oppress and ruin their fellow Subjects kept his favour pretty well and were Employed by him notwithstanding their being reputed Protestants a certain sign that the Reason he discharged Protestants from their Trusts and Offices was chiefly because he thought they would not serve him as he expressed it without reserve or contribute heartily to inslave themselves and their Posterity 4. He often declared and more especially in his Act for Liberty of Conscience made in his Parliament in Ireland that it was his constant Resolution that there should be no other Test or distinction amongst his Subjects but that of Loyalty by which all knew that he meant an absolute submission in every thing to his Will for he accounted every body disloyal that disputed or demurred at any of his Commands 5. As soon as the Irish began to dispute his Orders and stand on the Laws he took it heinously from them and they lost much of his favour he spake hardly of them and wished at any rate to be rid of them when the House of Commons crost some proposal of his he was very much out of humor and declared that all Commons were the same as he found by them when they quarrelled with the Earl of Melford his Secretary of State he complained that they used him basely and unkindly and that he never would have come amongst them if he had thought that they would not let him choose his own Servants when they would not suffer him to Dispense with their Act of Attainder or Pardon any Attained in it with a non obstante he is said to have fallen into so violent a Passion that his Nose fell a bleeding He was very angry with some of his Council when they demurred at his Levying twenty thousand pounds per month without Act of Parliament and said he could do nothing if he could not do that From whence we see that he reckoned all his Power nothing except he could impose Taxes as the King of France doth and that this lay at the bottom of all his Designs Nay it was commonly reported by the Roman Catholicks that King James boasted and pleased himself mightily that he had made himself Absolute which none of his Predecessors could do and had a more numerous Army than any of them and consequently was a more glorious King If then his chiefest design was to oppress our Laws and Liberties no body can doubt but he had Instruments whose Genius and Temper inclined them to assist him as long as they were like to go sharers with him in the Purchase SECT IX V. The Officers employed by King James were most of them unqualified by Law and consequently fit Instruments to destroy the Laws 1. MEN may live very comfortably in a Nation and yet be excluded from the Power or Government of it therefore it is no injustice to exclude a certain Rank of Men that want such Qualifications as may give the Common-Wealth confidence in them from intermedling in the Government Of this Nature we have had Laws in all Countries in the World and whatever be pretended they are very often both just and necessary nor is it reasonable that the King should have a power to dispense with such since they are often made on purpose to secure the Common-Wealth against his encroachments Of this Nature are our Laws that disable Papists from all Employments Civil and Military by an Act of Parliament made in the Reign of Henry VIII no Man is to Execute any Employment till he has taken the Oath of Supremacy This is repeated and confirmed by another in the second of Elizabeth And here it is
observable how they evaded this Statute It positively requires that every Officer shall take and receive a Corporal Oath there set down and if any refused to take it then he is to forfeit whatever Office he hath at the time of the refusal and be disabled to retain or Exercise any Office Now to elude this Law the Oath was never tendered to their new Officers and consequently said they they never refused it neither are they liable to the Penalties of this Act. This was plainly against the design of the Statute a playing with the Words of it and shewed us that all Laws were insufficient to secure us against such Jusuitical Prevaricators By an Act made in the time of Henry VII it is Treason to stir up the Irish Country to War against the English and by several other Laws made both in England and Ireland the Papists especially the Irish are disabled to hold Places of Power or Trust and particularly Papists are excluded from Freedom in Corporations by a Clause in the Act of Settlement on which the new Rules for Regulating Corporations made by the Earl of Essex at his first coming to the Government are founded Now so great was King James's Passion for these People that he was not content to have them about him to shew them Countenance and Favour but in defiance of so many Laws he would needs thrust them into the Government and set them over Protestants who in making those Laws had resolved not to be Governed by them and the Laws themselves being designed to exclude them we must not imagine that King James made this bold adventure for nothing or that he would disoblige the Body of his People without designing some signal advantage to himself by it he must have some peculiar service for these unqualified Persons to do in which the rest of the Nation would not assist him and that could be nothing else but the destruction of their Laws and Religion for in every thing else they were rather too ready to comply with him but those that came into their Places of Trust and of Profit in defiance of the Laws merely by his Favour must be ingaged as deeply as he to support the Power that preferred them and destroy the Laws that laid such Bars in their way to Honor and Profit The Contest is here between our Laws Religion and Liberties on the one side and the Kings Power on the other and the King was sure that those to whom the Laws were Enemies would likewise be Enemies to the Laws and never stick at any thing to support the Power that made them what they were if they should they must needs sink having nothing else to support them besides it Whoever therefore accepted any Place or Preferment against the Laws did thereby oblige himself to a boundless submission to all the Kings Commands and to Execute them however illegal and consequently was become a fit Instrument to Sacrifice the Laws and Religion of the Kingdom to the will of his Sovereign If therefore King James designed the destruction of these as I suppose is apparent that he did from what has been said in this Chapter we have no Reason to imagin that he would not have been able to compass his design for want of assistants to Execute it having so many fitted to his Hand in this Kingdom 2. And this answers that Objection which we hear from some who will not understand our Circumstances but tell us that we ought to have had Patience and let King James take his Course for though he had destructive Designs yet he was but one Man and could not Execute them against us in his own Person nor procure others to Execute them for him since all Men would be afraid to obey his illegal Commands as long as they could not but know that they were accountable to the Laws for every thing done against them but it appears from the account I have given of those Persons whom King James employed that they neither knew nor feared nor cared for the Laws And that their business and enmity was as great against them as against us being resolved to destroy both together which they had effectually done had not God sent us a Deliverer to prevent it CHAP. III. King James not only designed but attempted and made a considerable progress in our Destruction SECT I. The Introduction to the proof of this head grounded on a short view of the State of Ireland at the time of King James's coming to the Crown and of the vain assurances Protestants gave themselves of Security from the consideration of their Merits towards him the Repute of his good Nature and his own true Interest 1. THE destruction of a People is so horrid a thing that it is not easie to persuade a good natured Man that such an unnatural design can enter into any ones heart and we our selves though almost ruined dare hardly relate it to others lest they should not believe us It is certain that if the Protestants of these Kingdoms could have believed that King James would have attempted what he did they would never have entred into such Feuds against their fellow Subjects and Friends to prevent his Exclusion but their Zeal for the Monarchy and Succession made them willing to overlook the danger and they persuaded themselves that the absurdity and difculty of the thing would keep him if he came to the Crown from attempting it notwithstanding they knew that his Principles inclined him and his Counsellors would prompt him to it I question much if any thing but sad Experience would ever have opened the Eyes or convinced the generality of these Nations that his designs were such as we found them in the event and perhaps it is worth all our Sufferings though very heavy to have learned as we have done by this Example never to trust Men of King James's Principles and Religion with a Power that may destroy us since it appears in him that no Interest Difficulties or Obligations are sufficient to hinder such from employing that Power to effect it No Man could be under deeper Obligations to use his Power with Moderation than King James was yet in the short time he possessed it he employed it with so much diligence and earnestness to destroy us that he in a great measure accomplished it and we must thank God only and his present Majesties victorious Arms that saved us from a total and final Destruction to which we were so manifestly devoted To make this appear it will be necessary to take a short view of the State of Ireland at and since King James's coming to the Crown and by the Alteration he introduced it will plainly appear what he designed At his coming to the Crown Ireland was in a most flourishing Condition Lands were every where improved and Rents advanced to near double what they had been in a few years before the Kingdom abounded with Money Trade flourished even to the Envy of our
of Money to compound the Matter This Trick was very common and at last no Protestant tho he had ever so good Evidence against a Papist durst prosecute him for he was sure to be acquitted and then the Prosecutor was liable to the Revenge of an Action of the Case and the Damages that a Popish Jury pleased to give against him 12. There is an Act of Parliament 10 Henrici 7. cap. 12. That forbids keeping Guns or Ordnance without License from the Lord Lieutenant or Deputy The Design of it was to prevent the Irish from fortifying themselves in their little Castles whereby at that time they created the Government great Trouble and raised daily Rebellions But the Lord Chief Justice Nugent interpreted this to the disarming of all Protestants and because there chanced to be a Sword and Case of Pistols found September 6 1689 in some outward by place in Christs Church Dublin one Wolf the Subverger was committed to Newgate indicted and found guilty and had good luck to escape with his Life the Chief Justice declaring it was Treason tho Wolf was only indicted for a Misdemeanour 13. But had the Laws been in never so good Hands it could not have secured us from Destruction when the King who designed that Destruction against us pretended to be above all Laws and made no Scruple to dispense with them every Law in these Kingdoms is really a Compact between the King and People wherein by mutual consent they agree on a Rule by which he is to govern and according to which they oblige themselves to pay him Obedience But there is no general Rule but in some Cases it may prove inconvenient it is therefore agreed by all that in Cases of sudden and unforeseen Necessity there is no Law but may be dispensed with but then first it is observable that this Necessity must be so visible and apparent that all reasonable Men may see and be satisfied that it is not pretended and where the Necessity has been thus real no Man can shew that either the People or Parliament ever quarrelled with a King for using a dispensing Power 14. Secondly It must be observed that this Power of Dispensing in Cases of Necessity is mutual and belongs to the People as well as the King it being as lawful for a Subject in Cases of Necessity to dispense with his Obedience to a Law nay with his Allegiance to his King as for a King to dispense with the Execution of a Law or the exacting Obedience and this mutual power of dispensing with the Laws which are publick Compacts in Cases of Necessity is tacitly understood in them as well as in all other Covenants Doctor Sanderson proves this Power of Dispensing to belong to the People as well as to the Prince in his tenth Praelection N. 21. and he gives an Example in N. 22. The Case is thus The Conspirators after the Gunpowder Treason was discovered fled into Warwickshire and made an Insurrection the Sheriff raises the Posse Comitatus against them they fled from thence into Worcestershire where by the Law the Sheriffs of Warwick could not follow them but the Sheriff dispensed with the Law Judging saith he as he ought to have done That if he would perform right the Office of a good Subject the Observation of the Law in that Case of Necessity was very unseasonable and he ought to obey the Supreme Law which is the Safety of his Country The Sheriff did accordingly and was highly commended by King James the First for it There might be many Examples of this kind given in which the People are allowed to dispense even with their Allegiance in case of Necessity It is against the Allegiance of a Subject to own the Power of an Usurper to bear Arms to judge of Life and Death or administer Justice between Man and Man by his Commission and yet Dr. Sanderson determines it to be the Duty of a good Man to do all these if required by an Usurper Praelect 5. N. 19. and accordingly we find Judge Hales acted under the worst of Usurpers Oliver Cromwell and executed the Office of a Judge as may be seen in his Life 15. Thirdly 'T is the most wicked as well as hazardous thing that a King or People can do to pretend a necessity for dispensing with those publick Compacts when the pretence is not real for the publick Faith is hereby violated the party unconsulted is abused a just reason of Distrust raised between the King and People and they of the two that assume to themselves this power of dispensing upon a pretended not real necessity in Cases of great Moment to the Kingdom are in a fair way to lay a real necessity on the other party to dispense with their part of the Compact that is to say if the King will pretend a Necessity where there is none for his not governing by Laws in Cases that concern the common safety of the Kingdom he gives a shrewd Temptation and a justifiable Colour to his People to dispense with their Submission and Allegiance to him And it is full as good a Reason for a Peoples taking Arms to defend themselves against illegal Violence to alledge that they were necessitated to do so to prevent the Ruin and Destruction of them and their Posterity as it is for a King to alledge that he uses illegal Officers and Force to preserve himself and his Kingdoms And if the Allegation be real I do not see why it should not justifie the one as well as the other tho the one be against the Oath of Allegiance and the other against the Coronation Oath Cases of extreme Necessity being tacitly excepted in both Kings therefore that take on themselves to dispense with Laws without the consent either tacit or express of their People give an ill Precedent against themselves and must blame themselves if their People taught by them return it upon them 16. 'T is plain the Officers employed by King James in Ireland both Civil and Military were unqualified and uncapable by Law of those Employments If Lord Tirconnell for instance claimed Subjection of us by the Laws I do not see why he should expect the People to be better Observers of the Laws than he was Suppose that it was against the Law for them to resist him it was likewise against the Laws that he should command them if he dispensed in one Case they only dispensed in the other and in this Case it was as lawful for the one to dispense as the other I suppose the only Reason in a settled Government why one Man can claim our Submission and not another is because the known Laws give the one and not another the power of commanding but the Laws as well as the Interest of this Kingdom said positively that the Earl of Tirconnell and Men of his Character and Religion should not have any Office Civil or Military and therefore those Protestants that stood on their Defence against him
Purchases and Settlements This was the Bishop of Meath's Case whose Father purchased an Estate in 1636. and both he and the Bishop had continued in Peaceable Possession of it ever since yet he was now outed of it by an old Injunction from the Court of Claims granted on a pretended Deed of Settlement made for Portions to the Daughters of the Man that had sold it to the Bishop's Father This Deed ought to have been proved at Common-Law before he should have been disturbed but the Popish Sheriff of the County of Meath one Nangle executed the Injunction on the Bishop and two other Protestants without any such Formality some Papists were as deeply concern'd as they as holding part of the same Estate but the Sheriff durst not or would not execute the Injunction on their part though he did it on that part which was in the Hands of Protestants at this rate many Protestants were outed of their Estates and the old Proprietors having gotten Possession put the Suit and Proof on Protestants to recover them near a hundred English Gentlemen lost considerable Estates in less than a Year and the Papists were in hopes to do their work by their False Oaths Forged Deeds Corrupt Judges and Partial Juries No one Suit that I could learn having been determin'd against them in either the King's-Bench or Exchequer 4. But this was not the way design'd by the Grandees they saw it was like to be Tedious Expensive and must have been in many cases Insuccessful and therefore they were intent on a Parliament and they had in less than nine Months fitted all things for it So that we should infallibly have had one next Winter if the Closeted Parliament design'd to sit at Westminster in November 1688. had succeeded and the News of the Prince of Orange's intended Descent into England had not diverted them but it was not judged convenient to proceed farther in Ireland till the Penal Laws and Test were removed in England 5. After King James's deserting England and getting into France which mightily rejoyced them their great Care was to get him into their own Hands and they easily prevailed on him to come into Ireland where he landed at Kinsale March 12. 1688. and made his entry into Dublin on Palm-Sunday March 24. Upon his coming into Dublin every Body was intent to see what he would do in relation to the Affairs of Ireland it was manifestly against his Interest to call a Parliament and much more unseasonable to pass such Acts in it as he knew the Papists expected For First The Kingdom was not intirely in Obedience to him London-derry Enniskillin and a great part of the North being then unreduced which gave occasion to many even of his own Party to ridicule him and his Councils who so contrary to his Interest had call'd a Parliament to spend their time in wrangling about Settling the Kingdom and disposing Estates before they had reduced it But had they instead of Passing such Acts as made them Odious to all Good Men applied themselves to the Siege of Derry it is like it had been reduced before the Succors came and then all Ireland had been their own and no Body can tell what might have been the Consequence of it 6. Secondly It a little reflected on King James's Sincerity who in his Answer to the Petition of the Lords for a Parliament in England presented Nov. 17. 1688. gave it as one Reason why he could not comply because it was impossible whilst part of the Kingdom was in the Enemies Hands to have a Free Parliament The same Impossibility lay on him against holding a Parliament in Ireland at his coming to Dublin if that had been the True Reason and his not acting uniformly to it plainly discover'd That the True Reason why he would not hold a Parliament in England and yet held one in Ireland under the same Circumstances was not the pretended Impossibility but because the English Parliament would have secured the Liberties and Religion of the Kingdom whereas he was sure the Irish Parliament would Subvert them 7. Thirdly His Compliance with all the most Extravagant Proposals of the Papists in Ireland was unavoidable if he call'd a Parliament and to comply with them was to do so palpable and inexcusable Injustice to the Protestants and English Interest of Ireland that he could not expect but that he should lose the Hearts of those Protestants in England and Scotland who were indifferent or well affected to him before as soon as they were fully inform'd of what he had done in Ireland and to lose their Assistance was to lose the fairest Hopes he could have of recovering his Crown 8. Fourthly By holding a Parliament he manifesty weakened his Forces in Ireland for the Papists whom he was to restore to their Estates were most of them poor insignificant People not able or capable to do him Service for the Richer sort of Papists were either disoblig'd by it being losers as well as the Protestants or else under a necessity to neglect the King's Service and spend their time to make Interest to secure themselves of Reprizals for what they lost by the Parliament 9. Fifthly He strengthened and united his Enemies by rendering all the Protestants that were not under his Power Desperate and by convincing the rest of the Necessity of joyning with them as fast as they could since no other Choice was left them but either to do this or to be ruined 10. All these Reasons lay before the King against calling a Parliament and made it manifestly unseasonable to do it now however bent to comply with the long and earnest Sollicitations of the Irish as we see in Nagles Coventry Letter and the two Papers in the Appendix But contrary to all the Rules of Interest and true Policy he was resolv'd to gratifie them for which we were able to give no other reason but the Resolution ascribed to him in the Liege Letter either to dye a Martyr or to establish Popery and therefore he issued out a Proclamation for a Parliament to sit May 7. 1688. at Dublin The Proclamation was dated March 25. the next day after he came to Dublin but was not published till April 2. it was said to be antedated four days but of that I can say nothing 11. Every Body foresaw what a kind of Parliament this would be and what was like to be done in it Our Constitution lodges the Legislative Power in the King Lords and Commons and each of these is a Check on the other that if any one of them attempt a thing prejudicial to the Kingdom the other may oppose and stop it but our Enemies had made all these for their purpose and therefore no Law could signifie any thing to oppose them it being in their power to remove any Law when they pleased by repealing it The King was their own both inclined of himself and easie to be prevail'd on by them to do what they would have him So
came to be concluded not enduring to be present at the passing of that and some other Barbarous Acts against which they found their Votes signified nothing while they staid There were four more Protestants return'd of whose Behaviour I can give no account or how they came to be return'd The generality of the Houses consisted of the Sons and Descendents of the Forfeiting Persons in 1641. Men that had no Freeholds or Estates in the Kingdom but were purposely elected to make themselves Estates by taking them away from Protestants 15. Now whilst the power of making and repealing Laws was in such hands what Security could Protestants promise themselves from any Laws or what probability was there that any Laws already made in their Favour would be continued Especially if we consider further that this Parliament openly profess'd it self a Slave to the King's Will and he was look'd on as Factiously and Rebelliously inclin'd that would dare to move any thing after any Favorite in the House had affirm'd that it was contrary to the King's pleasure Several Bills were begun in the House of Commons one for erecting an Inns of Court another for repealing an Act commonly call'd Poinings Act which requires that all Acts should be perused by the King and Council of England before they be offered to be pass'd by the Parliament in Ireland but King James signified his Dissatisfaction to these Bills and for that reason they and several others were let fall tho the Irish had talk'd much and earnestly desir'd the Repeal of Poinings Act it being the greatest Sign and means of their Subjection to England There was a doubt made in the House concerning the Earl of Strafford whether he should be attainted for Estate and Life several moved in his behalf but it was carried against him upon this Evidence Colonel Simon Lutterell affirmed in the House That he had heard the King say some hard things of him The King's pleasure therefore was the Law to which we were to trust for our Lives and Fortunes our Enemies having entirely engross'd the power of making and repealing Laws and devolved it on the King's pleasure the very Protestant Lords and Bishops being denied their Priviledge of entering their Protestations against such Votes as they conceiv'd Destructive to the Kingdom The King told them That Protestations against Votes were only used in Rebellious times and with much ado they were allowed to enter their Dissent tho after that was allowed them the Clerk of the Parliament one Polewheele a Nephew of Chancellor Fitton 's shifted them off and did not enter their Dissent to some Votes tho often sollicited and press'd to do it according to the Orders of the House 16. When King James had labour'd as much as in him lay to get a Parliament that would repeal the Penal Laws and Test in England and open the Houses to Papists he found at last that the great Obstacle that rendered the Kingdom so averse to this was the general Fear and Apprehension that the Legislative Authority would be engross'd by them and turn'd against Protestants this was so obvious and reasonable a Surmise that he knew there was no hopes that the People would side with him against their present Majesties if something were not done to satisfie them and therefore to remove this fear he published his Proclamation dated Sept. 20. 1688. wherein he declares himself willing that Roman Catholicks should remain incapable to be Members of the House of Commons if the Protestants of England had reason to apprehend that Papists would engross the Legislative Authority in England and from the Example of Queen Mary's House of Commons to dread such Law givers how much more reason had the Protestants of Ireland to dread that power when entirely engrossed by their most inveterate Popish Enemies whose Interest as well as Religion oblig'd them to divest all those that profess'd the Reform'd Religion not only of the Favour but likewise of the Benefits of Law 17. They sate from the Seventh of May till the Twentieth of July following and in that short time entirely destroy'd the Settlement of Ireland and outed both the Protestant Clergy and Laity of their Freeholds and Inheritances It is not to be exspected I should give an account of all their Acts that which concerns this present Section is to shew how they destroy'd the Protestants real Estates 1. And that was first by an Act of Repeal whereby they took away the Acts of Settlement and Explanation by virtue of which as I have already shew'd two thirds of the Protestants of the Kingdom held their Estates that is all that which is call'd New Interest was lost by this Repeal there is no consideration had in it how any Man came to his Estate but tho he purchased it at ever so dear a rate he must lose it and it is to be restor'd without Exception to the Proprietor or his Descendent that had it before October 22. 1641. upon what account soever he lost it tho they themselves did not deny but many deserv'd to lose their Estates even Sir Phelim O Neal's Son the great Murtherer and Rebel was restor'd 2. In order to make a final Extirpation of Protestants they contrive and pass an Act of Attainder by which all Protestants whose Names they could find of all Ages Sexes and Degrees are attainted of High Treason and their Estates vested in the King the pretence of this Attainder was their being out of the Kingdom at the time of passing the Act as shall be shewn in the next Section 3. Least some should be forgotten of those that were absent and not put into the Bill of Attainder they contriv'd a general Clause in the Act of Repeal whereby the real Estates of all who Dwelt or staid in any place of the three Kingdoms which did not own King Jame's Power or corresponded with any such as they term Rebels or were any ways aiding abetting or assisting to them from the First day of August 1688. are declared to be forfeited and vested in his Majesty and that without any Office or Inquisition found thereof By which Clause almost every Protestant that could Write in the Kingdom had forfeited his Estate for the Packets went from London to Dublin and back again constantly from August to March 1688. and few had Friends in England or in the North but corresponded with them by Letters and every such Letter is made by this clause a Forfeiture of Estate They had intercepted and search'd every Packet that went or came the later part of this time and kept vast Heaps of Letters which were of no Consequence at all to the Government we wondered what the meaning of their doing so should be but by this Parliament we came to understand it for now these Letters were produced as Evidences in the House of Commons against those that appear'd in behalf of their absent Friends or oppos'd the attainting of such Protestants as they had some kindness for and they were
Romish Priests and Monks Writen by the Author of the former Book Entituled The Frauds of Romish Priests and Monks set forth in Eight Letters L. Annaei Flori Rerum Romanarum Epitome cum Interpretatione Notis in usum Serenissimi Delphini unà cum Indicibus copiosissimis oppidò necessariis Compendium Graecum Novi Testamenti continens ex 7959 versiculis totius Novi Testamenti tantum versiculos 1900 non tamen integros in quibus omnes universi Novi Test. voces unà cum Versione Latina inveniuntur Auctore Iohanne Leusden Editio quinta in qua non tantum Themata Graeca Voces derivatae exprimuntur sed etiam Tempora Verborum adduntur Tandem ne aliquid ubicunque desideretur in hac Novissima Editione Londinensi cuilibet Voci aut Compositae aut Derivatae Radix adjicitur propria in Tyronum gratiam De Presbyteratu Dissertatio Quadripartita Presbyteratûs sacri Origines naturam Titulum Officia Ordines ab ipsis Mundi primordiis usquè ad Catholicae Ecclesiae consummatum plantationem complectens in qua Hierarchiae Episcopalis Jus Divinum immutabile ex Auctoritate scripturarum Canonicè expositarum Ecclesiasticae Traditionis suffragiis brevitèr quidem sed luculentèr asseriter Authore Samuele Hill Diaeceseôs Bathoniensis Wellensis Presbytero Londini Typis S. Roycroft L. L. Oriental Typographi Regis Impensis R. Clavel in Coemeterio D. Pauli MDCXCI Sometime since Published for R. Clavel FOrms of Private Devotion for every day in the Week in a Method agreeable to the Liturgy with Occasional Prayers and an Office for the Holy Communion and for the Time of Sickness A Scholastical History of the Primitive and General Use of Lyturgies in the Christian Church together with an Answer to David Clarkson's late Discourse concerning Liturgies Roman Forgeries in the Councils during the first Four Centuries together with an Appendix concerning the Forgeries and Errors in the Annals of Baronius Ait idem Barclaius amitti regnum si Rex vere hostili animo in totius populi exitium feratur quod concedo confistere enim simul non possunt voluntas imparandi voluntas perdendi quare qui se hostem populi totius prositetur is eo ipso abdicat regnum Sed vix videtur id accidere posse in rege mentis compote qui uni populo imperet quod si pluribus populis imperet accidere potest ut unius populi in gratiam alterum vult preditum Idcirco enim frater carissime copiosum corpus est Sacerdotum concordiae mutuae glutino atque unitatis vinculo copulatum ut siquis eâ— collegio nostro Haeresim facere gregem Christi lacerare vastare tentaverit subveniant caeteri quasi pastores utiles misericordes qui oves dominicas in gregem colligant Cypri Ep. 67. Pamelii Socrates lib. 2. c. 22. Acts of the late pretended Irish Parliament C. 3. Pro defensione fidei prestant juramentum quod de terris suae jurisdictioni Subjectis universos haereticos ab ecclesia denotatos bona fide pro viribus exterminare studebunt Conc. Later IV. cap. 3. Concil Constantiens Sess. 45. Bull. Mart. De erroribus Johan Wickleff Declaration for Liberty of Conscience in Scotland See Appendix 28. Henry 8. cap. 13. 2. Elizab cap. 1. 10. Henry 7. cap. 13. Lord Clarendon's Speech at giving up the Sword to the Earl of Tirconnel and the Abstract of the Revenue for 1685. Appendix N. 5. 6. By what Interest and for what Design he came to be employed and at last to be made Deputy will appear from the Copy of a Letter found amongst Bishop Tyrrel's Papers his Secretary 'T is in the Appendix N. 3. Vide Ch. 2. Sect. 6. N. 2. Felix ô Neal was removed in 1689. and made a Collonel Sanders de oblig conscien praelect 9. 12. 19. Ubi tam gravis premit necessitas ut vir pius prudens non possit dubitare legislatorem ipsum si praesens esset legit sibi gratiam relaxationem concessurum liceat subditis communis utilitatis quae suprema lex est omnium legum finis rationem habere magis quam legum particulaâ—â—â—m Salus populi suprema Lex The Equity of which Maxim as it leaveth in the Law-giver a power of dispensing with the Law as he shall see it expedient to the publick Good so it leaveth in the Subject a Liberty upon just Occasions to do otherwise than the Law requires Dr. Sanderson's Judgment concerning Submission to Usurpers pag. 17. Edit Lond. 1678. Appendix N. 10. N. 7. See the Appendix for the List of Privy-Counsellors N. 9. a See Appendix N o 14. Appendix N o 14. Appendix N o 11. See Appendix Appendix See Appendix N o 15. Appendix N o 18. See the First Proclamation by the Earl of Tyrconnel Feb. 21. 1686. WHereas a late Proclamation issued forth by the Lord Lieutenant and Council of this Kingdom in December last for the Suppressing of Tories Robbers and their Harbourers in these Words following Whereas there have been of late many Burglaries and Robberies committed in several parts of this Kingdom to the ruin of some of his Majesties good Subjects and to the great disquiet of many others and it is found by experience that his Majesties Mercy that hath been heretofore extended to some Persons that have been attainted of such Crimes hath been an encouragement to others to commit the like c. Which Proclamation hath not yet met with the full effect c. See Appendix N o. 25. 'T was an ancient Law of England some say as Old as King Alfred That no King should change his Mony nor impair nor inhanse nor make any Mony but of Silver without the Assent of the Lords and all the Commons See Power of Parliaments asserted by Sir Robert Atkins p. 17. And Lord Cook Exposition of Stat. Artic super Chart. Cap. 2â— 2 Iâ—st 577. Chap. II. Sect. 4. See the Copy of a Letter to King James and Malony's Letter in the Appendix N. 4. 17. How is it possible a Parliament should be Free in all its Circumstances whilst an Enemy is in the Kingdom Append. N. 21. Appendix N. 24. See Appendix N. 23. Appendix N. 22. See the Articles in the Appendix n. 1â— See Appendix n. 28. See Dr. Walkers Siege of Derry See Appendix N. 31. See Appendix See Appendix N. 3 4. 17. 12 Eliz. Chap. 1st See the Appendix Molony's Scheme in his Letter N. 17. See the Proceedings of the Parliament of Paris upon the Pope's Bull Printed at London 1688. P. 5. Appendix N. 27. See the Petition in the Appendix N. 26. See Appendix N. 31. See Appendix N. 30. See Appendix N. 29. 1. It is unjust Reprizals It is not for the publick good Not for the King 's good It ruins the Kingdom It ruins the People in it It destroys the Publick Faith Inconvenient in point of time Loco Sigill '
Let this be Printed Nottingham White-Hall Octob. 15. 1691. THE STATE OF THE PROTESTANTS OF IRELAND Under the late King James's Government IN WHICH Their Carriage towards him is justified and the absolute Necessity of their endeavouring to be freed from his Government and of submitting to their present Majesties is demonstrated LONDON Printed for Robert Clavell at the Peacock at the West-end of St. Paul's 1691. HEADS of the DISCOURSE The INTRODUCTION Containing an Explication of the Doctrine of Passive Obedience and stating the true Notion and Latitude of it page 1 N. 1. That a King who designs to destroy a People abdicates the Government of them ib. 2. The Assertors of Passive Obedience own this but alledge the Case is not to be put p. 2 3. The Arguments of Passive Obedience from Reason and Scripture reach only Cases where the Mischief is particular or tolerable p. 3 4. A War not always a greater Evil than Suffering p. 5 5. The Division of the whole Discourse into four parts ib. Chap. 1. That it is lawful for one Prince to interpose between another Prince and his Subjects when he uses them cruelly p. 6 N. 1. This Point already cleared by several ib. 2. 1. Argument One Prince may have an Interest in the People and Government of another Prince ib. 3. 2. Argument That tho Destruction of a People by their Prince may only be a step to the Destruction of his Neighbours ib. 4. 3. Argument Charity and Humanity oblige every one who is able to succour the oppressed p. 7 5. 4. Argument God seems for this Reason to have divided the World into several Principalities ib. 6. 5. Argument From the Authority of Christian Casuists p. 8 7. 6. From the Practice of Christian Princes Constantine the Great Constantine his Son King Pepin the Holy War c. ib. 8. The Objection from the Oath of Allegiance c. answered from Falkner p. 9 9. From it not being lawful to assist any Prince in an ill Cause p. 10 10. From King Jame's abolishing those Oaths here in Ireland ib. Chap. 2. King James designed to destroy the Protestant Religion p. 12 Sect. 1. The possibility of a King 's designing the Destruction of his Subjects ib. N. 1. That it is necessary the Princes Design should be very evident to justifie the Opposition of his Subjects ib. 2. An Answer to the Objection who shall be Judge ib. 3. Example of Princes that have had such Designs against their Subjects p. 13 Sect. 2. Shewing from the Obligations of his Religion that King James designed to destroy Protestant Subjects p. 14 N. 1. Proved from the Councils of Lateran and Constance from King James's Zeal Confessors and Allies ib. 2. That no Promises of the Prince nor Laws of the Land can secure Protestant Subjects p. 16 Account of Jerome of Prague's safe Conduct p. 17 Sect. 3. King James's Design to ruin his Protestant Subjects proved from the Profession of that whole Party that were most privy to his Councils who privately warned their Protestant Friends of it ib. Sect. 4. The same destructive Designs proved from the Officers employed by him p. 19 N. 1. The Ground of the different Interests of Ireland Account of the Rebellion in 1641 ib. 2. The Subjects Security is that the Officers employed by the King are responsible for what they do amiss p. 20 3. The Officers employed by King James not only not responsible but fitted to destroy us upon account of the five Qualifications following p. 21 Sect. 5. Upon Account of their being Men generally of no Fortune p. 22 N. 1. King James employed such in the Army and Civil Offices and such were his Favourites p. 22 2. He employed such in Corporations p. 23 3. Men of Estates that followed him out of England had little Interest with him ib. 4. The Reason of this that they might not stick at illegal Commands p. 24 Sect. 6. Upon Account of their Insufficiency for their Emploments ib. N. 1. The Roman Catholicks generally insufficient for Business by their long Disuse ib. 2. The Inconveniences of this in the Courts and City p. 25 3. In the Country p. 26 4. Those employed were incapable of Improvement p. 27 Sect. 7. Upon account of their loose Principles and want of Moral Honesty ib. N. 1. Knavery Robbery or Forgery no Bar to Preferments in King James his Army or Employments ib. 2. The lewdest Converts favour'd p. 29 3. All of them very uncharitable and void of Compassion to Hereticks p. 30 4. Many Perjuries amongst them ib. Sect. 8. Upon Account of their Genius and Inclination to destroy the Laws c. p. 31 N. 1. The ancient Condition of the Tenants and Landlords of Ireland ib. 2. The Landlords that did not forfeit their Estates 1641 retained the Genius of their Ancestors p. 32 3. The Humour and Way of Living of such as formerly forfeited or had sold their Estates ibid. 4. The English Laws were intolerable to the old Landlords that retain'd their Estates p. 33 5. Much more to those that had lost them and most of all to the Popish Clergy ibid. 6. King James employed and trusted those most whose Interest and Temper made them greatest Enemies to the Laws p. 34 by the Laws in employing Soldiers ibid. 8. Secondly That Protestants would not serve his turn Answer This only shews what he designed against us p. 57 9. Thirdly That such Levies were necessary in the Kings Circumstances Answer The Papists had brought that necessity The raising and modeling this Army a plain instance of King James's design to destroy us ibid. Sect. 3. Secondly King James's dealing with the Courts of Judicature p. 58 1. Justice in the Hands of â—it Persons the support of a Kingdom King James put it into the most unfit Hands being such as were bent to destroy the Protestants and English Interest ibid. 2. Chancery Primate Boyle and Sir Charles Porter removed Fitton put in His Character His Inclination and Behaviour towards Protestants and great partiality to them ibid. 3. Masters of Chancery of the same sort p. 60 4. On the other Benches one Protestant Judg kept in for a Colour without Power The like done by Burgesses in Corporations p. 61 5. Kings Bench Nugent's Character great Partiality Instance in Captain Fitz Gerald anâ— Sir Gregory Birn Nugent's great hand in the Bill of Attainder c. Sir Bryan ô Neal's Character p. 61 62 6. Excâ—equer Sir Stephen Rice's Character His Inveteracy to Protestants and enmity to the Act of Settlement p. 63 7. Common Pleas little to do Keating's and Daley's Characters p. 64 8. Circuits Alike ill for Protestants Instance Tirrell's Affidavit ibid. 9. Attorney General Sir Richard Nagle his Character and Partiality Instance in Fitz Gerald and Sir William Petty Speaker of the House of Commons drew up the Acts of Repeal and Attainder and betrayed the Kings Prerogative p. 65 66 10. Administration of the Laws turned to the Protestants ruin p. 66 11. Instances in
p. 118 119 3. Protestants impoverished by vexatious Law Suits p. 119 4. By Delays and the Treachery of Popish Council p. 120 5. By defending their Charters and being forced to take out new ones ibid. 6. By free Quarters Inkeepers and Houskeepers ruined p. 121 7. By the burden of Priests and Fryars p. 122 Sect. 10. Thirdly King James's own Attempts on the same p. 123 1. Quartering on private Houses contrary to the Articles to Lord Mountjoy Most Soldiers had many Quarters Mischievous in their Quarters Instance in Brown who robbed his Landlord and swore Treason against him p. 123 124 2. Plundering and killing the Protestants Stock Vast numbers destroyed and stolen p. 125 3. Irish encouraged to do so no Redress upon Complaints p 126 4. Nugent avowed it Rapparees Necessary Evils Stop put to this Trade when they began to rob one another p. 127 Sect. 11. Fourthly King James's further Methods to compleat the ruin of the Protestants Personal Fortunes p. 128 1. Taking away Absentees Goods Bill for it in Parliament ibid. Methods to drain those that staid of their ready Mony p. 129 1. By Licences for Ships to go for England ibid. 2. By pretended Liberty of Transporting Goods p. 130 3. Licences for Persons to go for England ibid. 4. By Protections granted and voided ibid. 5. By seizing Mony and Plate upon Informations ibid. 6. Boiselot's Dragooning of Cork ibid. 7. Act for the Subsidy at 20000 l. per Month on Lands ibid. 2. Second Subsidy of 20000 l. per Month on Personal Estates ibid. Debates in Council about this and Manner of ordering it ibid. 3. Tax for the Militia p. 132 4. Tax for fortifying the Avenues of Dublin ibid. 5. Tax for quartering Soldiers call'd Bed-Mony p. 133 6. Brass Mony Illegal Void the necessity of Parliaments ibid. Of what Metal and how much coined viz. 965375 l. in one year p. 134 Forced to be taken in all Payments ibid. Fitton forced it on Trustees for Orphans p. 135 7. Lutterell forced it on pain of Death by the Provost-Martial ibid. On Smith Leeson Bennet Widow Chapman her barbarous usage ibid. Papists not forced to receive it from Protestants p 136 8. Seizing of Protestants Wooll Hides Tallow p. 137 Peircy to have bin hanged for saying he was not willing to part with them p. 138 Protestants not permitted to Export them Their Imports seized ibid. 9. Seizing of Corn and Mault The Treason of having Bisket Giles Meigh p. 139 Difficult for Protestants to get Corn or Bread this before Harvest would have forced out all their Silver ibid. 10. Seizing Wool as soon as shorn p. 140 Searching Houses for Copper and Brass for the Mint and taking private Accompts of what else the Protestants had in in their Houses ibid. 11. Lord Mayors rating of Merchant Goods Forced on the Protestants but disregarded by the Papists instance in the very Lord Mayor himself ibid. 12. Proclamation to Rate Silver and Gold in Exchange for Brass on pain of death p. 141 13. Inference from the whole ibid. Sect. 12. Fifthly King James's destruction of the Protestants Real Estates p. 142 1. Explication of old and new Interest and account of the Acts of Settlement and of the Tenure by which the Protestants held their Estates ibid. The Papists outed of their Estates by the late Rebellion still kept up a claim to them and made Jointures and Settlements of them which were confirmed in King James's Parliament p. 143 2. King James at his first coming to the Crown gave out he would preserve the Acts of Settlement Lord Clarendon Lord Chancellor Porter and the Judges in Circuit directed to declare it ibid. The Papists knew it was only colour p. 144 Nagle's Coventry Letter first openly broke the matter October 26. 1686. ibid. Tirconnell at his coming Governour leaves it out of the Proclamation ibid. Nugent and Rice sent to England to concert the methods of Repealing it but concealed for the present their success p. 145 At their return prepared for a Parliament ibid. For which Matters had been fitted by the Quo Warranto's and reversal of Outlawries against the Irish Peers ibid. 3. Papists had not patience to wait for their Estates till a Parliament but went to work by counterfeit Deeds and by old Injunctions of the Court of Claims p. 146 4. Matters ripe for a Parliament but put off till the Parliament which was to sit in England November 1688. should take off the Penal Laws c. p. 147 5. at King James's arrival in Ireland it was against his Interest to call a Parliament First because of loss of time the Kingdom not reduced ibid. 6. Secondly which was King James's Allegation for not calling one in England this reflected on his sincerity p. 148 7. Thirdly It was the way to disoblige all that were inclined to him in England and Scotland ibid. 8. Fourthly It disobliged a great many of the Irish themselves ibid. 9. Fifthly It rendered all not under his power desperate p. 149 10. Against all Reason and Interest he called one being resolved to Dye a Martyr or Establish Popery ibid. 11. This Parliament fitted for our ruin both in respect of the King and of both Houses ibid. 13. Method of filling the House of Lords with Popish Peers Only four or five Protestant Temporal and four Spiritual Lords ibid. Several Acts past not by consent of these last though it be pretended in their Preambles p. 150 14. House of Commons how filled Manner of Electing Members Only two Protestants that could be called such in it p. 151 15. The whole House a slave to the Kings Will. No Protestations allowed p. 153 16. How much Reason we as well as England had to dread Papists in a Parliament p. 154 17. First Account of the Act of Repeal ibid. Secondly Of the Act of Attainder p. 155 Thirdly Clause in it of holding Correspondence since Aug. 1. 1688. ibid. Fourthly Clause of cutting off Remainders p. 156 Fifthly No Protestant might hope to be reprized by the Act of Repeal ibid. Sixthly Clause in the Act of Attainder against the Kings Pardoning which was the Reason this Act was kept so secret Copy procured by Mr. Coghlan Upon account of Sir Thomas Southwell's Pardon Sollicited by Lord Seaforth King James in a Passion with Sir Richard Nagle for betraying his Prerogative by this Clause against Pardoning p. 157 158 159 18. Observations First King James could not dispense when the Irish pleased ibid. Secondly Near three thousand Protestants condemned for not coming in by a day and yet the Act never published but kept secret ibid. Thirdly Folly of attainted Persons to think of ever being Pardoned if King James be restored since it is not in his power p. 160 Fourthly Papists got into their Estates before the time set in the Act of Repeal ibid. 19. Means how the Papists got Possessions p. 161 First Popish Tenants attorn'd to their old Popish Landlords ibid. Secondly Advantages taken of Clauses in the Act of Repeal ibid.
Thirdly From Orders about Garrisoning Mansion-Houses Sending the Protestant Owners to the Goal who must never have expected either their Houses or Lives if King James had prevailed ibid. Estates of Absentees disposed of and promised to Papists p. 162 20. Objection That King James did not know the Consequence of Repealing the Acts of Settlement ibid. Answer First King James understood them better than any and held ten thousand pounds a year by them when Duke of York ibid. Secondly King James would not hear the Protestants plead at the Bar against the Repeal p. 163 Thirdly Bishop of Meath in a Speech in the House set forth the ill Consequences at large ibid. Fourthly The Protestants opposed it from Point to Point ibid. Fifthly Protestants were resolved to use their utmost that the ill intents of their Adversaries might appear the more p. 164 Sixthly Lord chief Justice Keating's Paper given to King James in behalf of Purchasers rejected ibid. 21. Protestants lost more in Ireland than all that favour King James's Cause in England are worth p. 165 Sect. 13. Eighthly The danger into which King James brought the lives of his Protestant Subjects in Ireland ibid. 1. At King James's Coming no General Pardon though it had been his Interest in respect of England ibid. 2. Is not chargeable with particular Murders further than by arming such Men as would be guilty of them p. 166 3. The Governments Design upon our Lives ibid. First by feigned Plots and Protecting the Perjured Witnesses Instance in Spikes Case The Dumb Friar p. 167 Secondly By wresting Facts to Treason Nugent declar'd Protestants having Arms to be so p. 168 Thirdly By violating Articles Mr. Brown of Cork Town of Bandon Earl of Inchiquin Captain Boyle Sir Thomas Southwell and his Party Lord Mountjoy's Soldiers Fort of Culmore King James's approach to Derry Captain Dixy Kenaght Castle p. 169 170 Fourthly By violating Protections p. 171 Protestants of Down p. 171 Protestants brought before Derry by General Rosen Bishop of Meath applyed to King James about it King James excused Rosen p. 173 174 Captain Barton of Carrick Mac Cross p. 175 Fifthly By private Orders and Proclamations with the penalty of Death Several Instances p. 178 Sixthly By the Act of Attainder Abstract of it Archbishops 2 Duke 1 Temporal Lords 63 Ladies 22 Bishops 7 Knights 85 Clergymen 83 Esquires and Gentlemen 2182 2445 p. 179 180 Not equalled by the Proscription at Rome Great part Attainted on Common Fame p. 182 Observations on the Act ibid. 1. Leaves no room for the King to Pardon ibid. 2. The Act concealed Out of the Power of an English Parliament to Repeal it by the Act for cutting off Ireland from England p. 183 3. The hast in drawing it up ibid. 4. Many left out particularly the Collegians and how ibid. 5. Applications in behalf of Protestants made their Case worse p. 184 6. Allowing of time to prove Innocency a meer Collusion ibid. 1. None knew what time was given ibid. 2. None knew what they would call Innocency Instance Desmineer and Ginnery ibid. 3. The Embargo on this side would not let them know on the other side 4. The Embargo on the other side would not let them come hither 5. To have come would have been an unwise Venture p. 177 4. Objection That few Protestants lost their Lives p. 178 Answer 1. When it is known how many have perished they will not appear few ibid. 2. The Irish Papists would not venture at much Murthering till they were past an after Reckoning they feared such Cruelty would be revenged on Roman Catholicks in England ibid. 3. Protestants were cautious not to provoke them and were true to one another p. 179 4. We dont know what would have been done with Attainted Persons ibid. 5. Protestants if Obnoxious absconded or escaped ibid. 6. The Support of King James's Army depended on the Protestants p. 179 Scotch Officers that came here wondered to find how Protestants were used having heard so much the contrary at home p. 180 The same given out in England Pity but those who believed and forwarded it had been sent hither ibid. The Irish doing what they did in their Circumstances what would they have done if left to their swing ibid. Sect. 14. Ninthly The method King James took to destroy our Religion p. 181 1. The Attempts against our Lives and Fortunes no sudden thing but the result of a long Design for which Tirconnel had 20000 l. per annum ibid. 2. King James pretended Liberty of Conscience but not to be expected from a Roman Catholick ibid. 3. The Laws and Coronation Oath secured our Religion The Clergy had merited from King James by opposing the Exclusion and disobliged their People p. 182 4. At his coming to the Crown the Roman Catholicks declared that his Promises to the Church were not intended for Ireland p. 183 Sect. 15. First By taking away our Schools and Universities p. 184 1. Lord Tirconnell put the Schools contrary to Law into the hands of Papists ibid. 2. And would have put in Popish Fellows into the College ibid. 3. Stopt the College Pension of 388 l. per annum from Easter 1688. turned out the Fellows and Students seized on the Library and Furniture p 193 4. Forbid three of them on pain of Death not to meet together p. 194 5. King James did not fill up vacant Bishopricks and Livings in his Gift ibid. 6. And allowed nothing for supplying the Cures p. 195 7. All the Bishops and Livings in the Kingdom would soon have come into the Kings hands p. 196 8. This not the effect of our Constitution the same in Popish Countries Thirty five Bishopricks void in France in 1688. King James's Ungratefulness to the Protestant Clergy ibid. Sect. 16. Secondly By taking away the Maintenance of the Clergy p. 197 1. Book-Mony denyed by the Papists from King James's coming to the Crown ibid. 2. Priests put in for Tythes Hardly recovered by Protestants p. 198 3. An Act of their Parliament applied Papists Tythes to the Priests ibid. 4. And Protestants Tythes too when the Priests had the Benefices ibid. 5. The Priests forc'd into Possession of Glebes where there were any p. 199 6. Protestant Clergy little better for the Tythes left to them Protestants had little Tythings left Priests by Dragoons seized what there was never wanted Pretences ibid. 7. House-Mony in Corporations taken away by their Parliament Pleaded against before the House of Lords but in vain p. 200 8. The same took away Ulster Table of Tythes p. 201 9. Duties payable to the King out of Livings were exacted wholly from the Protestant Incumbents though they had nothing left to them of their Livings their Persons seized and sent to Goal ibid. Collonel Moore Clerk of the First Fruits imprisoned because he would not be severe against them p. 202 Sect. 17. Thirdly By taking away the Jurisdiction of the Protestant Church ibid. 1. The Churches Right by Prescription to Jurisdiction ibid. 2. Act
of their Parliament destroyed this Jurisdiction by exempting all that please to be Dissenters p. 203 3. In most Diocesses the Bishops Dead or Attainted ibid. 4. They encouraged the most Refractory Dissenters Quakers against the Church p. 204 5. Likewise leud and debauched Converts ibid. 6. The Kings Courts hindred Bishops Proceedings against debauched Clergymen Instance in Ross and the Bishop of Killmore ibid. 7. King James appointed Chancellors Gordon a Papist in Dublin King James asserted a Power over his Protestant though not over his Roman Catholick Clergy A gross breach of Trust and provoking Temptation to his People p. 205 206 8. Papists encouraged Debauchery and had rather have us of no Religion than Protestants p. 206 Sect. 18. Fourthly By taking away their Churches p. 208 1. Priests declared they would have our Churches Act of their Parliament gave them to them with the Livings as they fell ibid. 2. At Duke Schonberg's landing they set the Rabble to deface them Instance in Trim and other Rudenesses p. 209 3. The Churches seized in Dublin Feb. 24. 1688. to put Arms in September 6. 1689. to search for Arms. Barbarities used in them In October and November the Churches seized throughout the Kingdom ibid. 4. By the Officers or Magistrates of the Army Christ Church Dublin seized p. 210 5. Protestants Complain and press to King James the Act for Liberty of Conscience Are referred by him to the Law ibid. 6. The injustice of this p. 211 7. For a colour to England and Scotland King James issues a Proclamation against seizing Churches which served only to hasten the doing of it ibid. 8. Priests slighted the Proclamation p. 212 9. Applications made to the King for Relief ibid. 10. On behalf of Waterford and Wexford King James Orders Restitution but is refused to be obeyed by the Mayors and Officers ibid. 11. On new Applications from the Protestants he refers Waterford Petition to the Earl of Tyrone Governor of Waterford who calls their Church a place of strength and turns it into a Garrison The Mayor of Wexford turned out but the Church never restored p. 213 12. When King James would have kept his word to us it was not in his Power by means of his Clergy ibid. 13. Act for Liberty of Conscience provides not against Disturbers of Assemblies p. 214 14. Many Disorders committed by their Soldiers in our Churches ibid. 15. Christ Church Dublin shut up September 6. Seized October 27. September 13. all Protestants are forbid to assemble July 13. 1689. all Protestants confined to their Parishes though two or three Parishes have but one Church June 30. more than five Protestants forbid to meet on pain of Death Had King James succeeded at the Boyne we should never have had our Churches again Liberty of Conscience brought to this p. 215 216 Sect. 19. Fifthly By encouraging Converts and ill Treatment of the Protestant Clergy p. 216 1. Protestant Wives severely treated by their Husbands Servants by their Masters Tenants by their Landords ibid. 2. Those that turned escaped Robberies c. p. 217 3. Protestant Clergy sure to be Plundered Bishops of Laughlin and Waterford ibid. 4. Without Horses in the Country and afronted in the Streets of Dublin p. 218 5. Dr. Foy's Treatment for resuting Mr. Hall Dr. King 's in his own Church Mr. Knight's by the Mayor of Scarborough c. ibid. 6. Oaths tendered them and upon their refusal imprisoned Hindred from visiting their Sick by Priests p. 219 7. Forced the Ministers to go about to take the number of their Parishoners p. 220 Sect. 20. Sixthly By Misrepresentations of them and their Principles p. 221 1 2. Priests told ignorant People that our Church allowed the King might oblige all his Subjects to be of his Faith ibid. 3. From the Doctrine of Non-Resistance they told us the King might use us as the Grand Seignior or the French King does his Subjects ibid. 4. King James warned the young Mr. Cecills against our Bishops as ill Men and all false to him p. 222 5. Yalden's weekly Abhorrences Scandalous falshood of Dr. King and Dr. Foy ibid. 6. Defence upon the whole of desiring and promoting King William to rescue us p. 224 7. From the lawfulness of the Grecians to desire or accept the like from a Christian Army ibid. Chap. IV. That there remained no prospect of Deliverance for us but from their present Majesties p. 225 1. There remained no defence for us from the Laws or King James ibid. 2. Unreasonable to trust to a new Miracle ibid. 3. Our Adversaries scoft us with Preaching Patience as Julian did the Christians ibid. 4 Mad at their Prey being rescued by his present Majesty p. 226 CHAP. V. A short Account of those Protestants who left the Kingdom and of those that stayed 228 Sect. 1. Concerning those who went away ibid. 1. Reason of this Section ibid. 2. No Law against Subjects Transporting themselves into the English Dominions ibid. 3. The Danger of staying and no prospect of doing good by their stay in Ireland 229 4. No prospect of being able to subsist in Ireland ibid. 5. The Reason of Clergy Mens going 230 6. The going away of so many of all sorts could not be without sufficient cause p. 231 7. Nor from a sudden and panick fear because it continued to the last p. 232 Sect. 2. Concerning those that stayed p. 233 1. Distribution of those that stayed into four sorts ibid. 2. First The meaner People either could not get away or were left in charge with the Concerns of those that went ibid. 3. Secondly The Gentlemen dreaded to beg or starve in England ibid. 4. Were willing to secure what they had if they could p. 234 5. Were desirous to Protect their poor Dependants ibid. 6. Were useful in interceding for and relieving many Distrest p. 235 7. In Counselling and advising inferior Protestants ibid. 8. Thirdly Those that had Employments their stay of great importance in preserving Records c. p. 236 9. Not safe for them to decline Acting till they were forced p. 237 10. In many Cases they were very beneficial to their Fellow Protestants ibid. 11. The few that did otherwise ought to suffer ibid. 12. Fourthly The Clergy need no Apology for staying Their Serviceableness in several instances p. 238 Conclusion 1. DIsclaiming Prejudice and Partiality p. 239 2. It were to be wished that Commissions might issue to enquire into the Damages of Protestants ibid. 3. The Irish may blame themselves for what they shall suffer in Consequence of these Troubles ibid. Index of the Appendix THE Act of Attainder in Ireland at large p. 241 The Persuasions and Suggestions the Irish Catholicks make to his Majesty supposed to be drawn up by Talbot Titular Archbishop of Dublin and found in Collonel Talbot's House July 1. 1671. p. 298 A Copy of a Letter of the Irish Clergy to King James in favour of the Earl of Tirconnell found amongst Bishop Tirrell's Papers in Dublin p. 301 The Copy
of a Letter sent the King August 14. 1686. found in Bishop Tirrel's but imperfect p. 303 Lord Clarendon's Speech in Council on his leaving the Government of Ireland p. 310 A General Abstract of the Gross Produce of his Majesties Revenue in Ireland in the three first years of the Management beginning at Christmas 1682. and ended Christmas 1685. p. 312 Sheriffs for the year 1687. p. 313 Lord Lieutenants and Debuty Lieutenants of Counties p. 324 Privy Councellors appointed by Letters from King James dated February 28. 1684. and such as were sworn since by particular Letters p. 333 The Civil List of Officers and the times of their entring on their Offices p. 334 An account of the General and Field Officers of King James's Army out of the Muster Rolls p. 341 A Copy of the Letter dispersed about the Massacre said to be designed on December 9. 1688. p. 345 Lord Mountjoy's Circular Letter on his going to France p. 346 Judge Keating's Letter to Sir John Temple December 29. 1688. p. 347 Proposals humbly offered to the Earl of Tyrconnell Lord Deputy by the Bishop Meath about the intended search for Arms p. 353 An account of the Conditions made in the Field between the High Sheriff of Gallway and the Prisoners afterwards condemned p. 356 A Copy of a Letter from Bishop Maloony to Bishop Tyrrell the Original found amongst Bishop Tyrrell's Papers March 8. 1689. p. 360 Presentment of the Grand Jury of Tipperary against Protestants p. 365 A List of all the Men of Note that came with King James out of France or that followed him after so far as could be Collected p. 366 A List of the Lords that sate in the pretended Parliament at Dublin held May 7. 1689. p. 369 The names of the Knights Citizens and Burgesses returned to the Parliament beginning May 7. 1689. p. 370 An Address to King James in behalf of Purchasers under the Act of Settlement by Judg Keating p. 377 The Lord Bishop of Meath's Speech in Parliament June 4. 1689. p. 389 Copies of the Orders for giving Possessions p. 388 Albaville's Instructions to the Commissioners of Oyer and Terminer p. 392 A Petition of the Minister of Wexford for his Church and the Order thereupon p. 395 Mr. Prowd Minister of Trim his account of the remarkable Accident that happened upon Plundering the Church of Trim p. 397 General Rosen's Order to bring the Protestants before Derry p. 399 Advertisement as it was published by Mr. Yalden in his weakly Abhorrence concerning Dr. King and Dr. Foy p. 404 Collonel Lutterell's Order for numbering Protestants p. 406 Collonel Lutterell's Order forbidding above five Protestants to meet any where p. 407 THE STATE OF THE Protestants of Ireland Under the late King James's Government IN WHICH Their Carriage towards him is justified and the absolute Necessity of their endeavouring to be freed from his Government and of submitting to their present Majesties is demonstrated INTRODUCTION Containing an Explication of the Doctrine of Passive Obedience and stating the true Notion and Latitude of it 1. IT is granted by some of the highest assertors of Passive Obedience that if a King design to root out a people or destroy one main part of his Subjects in favour of another whom he loves better that they may prevent it even by opposing him with force and that he is to be judged in such a case to have Abdicated the Government of those whom he designs to destroy contrary to Justice and the Laws This is Grotius's Opinion in his Book De jure Belli Pacis lib. 1. cap. 4. § 11. where citing Barclay he says If a King be carried with a malitious design to the destruction of a whole Nation he loses his Kingdom which I grant since a will to Govern and to Destroy cannot consist together therefore he who professes himself an Enemy to a whole People doth in that very act Abdicate his Kingdom But it seems hardly possible that this should enter into the heart of a King who is not mad if he govern only one people but if he govern many it may happen that in favour of one people he may desire the other were destroyed Doctor Hammond asserts Passive Obedience as high as any yet he approves this passage of Grotius and of Barclay in his vindication of Christ's reprehending S. Peter from the exceptions of Mr. Marshall p. 327. of his first Volume Grotius saith he mentions some cases wherein a King may be resisted As in case a King shall Abdicate his Kingdom and manifestly relinquish his Power then he turns private man and may be dealt with as any other such And some other the like 2. And it is observable that generally in all Books and Sermons concerning Obedience to Governors where this case is put suppose a King endeavour to destroy his people there are only two answers given to it one is that his Officers and Ministers ought not to obey him if they do the Law will punish them The other is that this case ought not to be put that we ought not to suppose that any King will designedly endeavour to destroy his people nay the Author of Jovian will not allow us to suppose that any King will attempt in England to Govern altogether by Arbitrary Power and the Sword For says he Chap. 12. p. 272. To suppose this is plainly to suppose the utmost impossibility and p. 273. If a King should shut up the Courts obstruct or pervert Justice he allows that all his good Subjects and all the bad too that tendered their own safety would desert him and Chap. 6. p. 152. He says he should be tempted to pray for the destruction of such a Prince as the only means of delivering the Church Falkner in his Christian Loyalty B. 2. Chap. 5. N. 19 20 tells us But if ever any such strange case as is supposed should really happen I confess it would have its great difficulties He brings in Grotius De jure Belli Pacis lib. 1. cap. 4. N. 7. And Bishop Bilsons Christian Subjection Part 3. p. 519. edit 1585. as allowing it and seems to allow their judgment in the case but then tells us that the case above-mentioned ought not at all to be supposed or taken into consideration All which plainly grants that if a King do in earnest design the destruction of his Subjects and get Ministers and Officers to concur with him in it who are ready to execute his wicked intentions and against whom the Law yields no Protection that in such a case the Subjects may desert their Prince decline his Government and Service and seek Protection where they can find it 3. And indeed whoever considers the Discourses that have been written concerning Non-Resistance will find that the reasons given for it either from the nature of the Thing or Scripture reach only tolerable evils and prove that a man ought to be patient under pressures laid on him by his Governor when the mischief is not
make it an incredible Thing is so far from being impossible that it is very common of which there are so many Examples both ancient and modern that it is a wonder that Men who know any thing of History should overlook them Nero Caligula Domitian Maximinus Heliogabalus Commodus not only endeavoured but professed it and some of them were mightily concerned that it was not in their power to accomplish it No longer ago than the time of Philip the Second of Spain we have an Example of a Christian King no better than those Heathens Whoever reads the Story of his dealing with the Low Countries must confess that he design'd the utter Destruction of the Laws and Liberties of those People and that in particular he was resolved that not one Protestant should be left alive amongst them The same has been designed and effected in a great measure by the present French King against his Protestant Subjects and he must have a great share either of Impudence or Stupidity that can deny this Prince to have designed and purposely contrived that destruction and by the same Rule that a Man can be so wicked and barbarous as to design the destruction of a third or fourth part of his People he may design the destruction of the greatrr part if they will be such Fools as to suffer him to effect it SECT II. Shewing from the Obligations of his Religion that King James designed to destroy us IT is easie to demonstrate that every Roman Catholick King if he throughly understand his Religion and do in earnest believe the Principles of it is obliged if he be able to destroy his Protestant Subjects and that nothing can excuse him from doing it but want of power This is plain from the third Chapter of the fourth Lateran Council and from the Council of Constance in the Bull that confirms it read in the 45. Session if therefore a Popish King can persuade his Protestant Subjects to submit to him whilst he doth it he is obliged by his Principles to destroy them even when they are the greater part and Body of his Subjects Now King James was as is known to all the World a most zealous Roman Catholick and ingaged with that party of them that most zealously assert and practise this Doctrine of rooting out Hereticks He gave himself up intirely to the Conduct and guidance of Jesuits these were the Governors and Directors of his Conscience and he seemed to have no other Sentiments than such as they inspired into him If then these have prevailed with the French King whom some report to be a merciful Man in his own Nature and certainly a mighty Zealot for his Honor to break his most solemn established Laws violate his repeated Declarations and Oaths and in spite of all these to persecute and destroy his Protestant Subjects if the same have prevailed with the Duke of Savoy to do the like though as he is now convinced manifestly against his Interest nay almost to his own Destruction having lost thereby his best and most resolute and useful Subjects who would have served him most Cordially against France the Enemy he ought most to dread and which one day will swallow up his Dukedom if his Allies do not prevent it If lastly they have prevailed with the Emperor to involve himself in a War that has now lasted about twenty years and almost lost him his Empire rather than suffer a few Protestants to live quietly in Hungary Is not our late Kings being of the same Principles and under the Government of the same Directors of Conscience is not his fondness of France and his Alliance with it his affecting to imitate that King in every thing and above all his prosecuting the same if not worse methods towards the Protestants in Ireland that the King of France did with the Hugonots in his Dominions a clear and full proof of both Kings being in the same design to root out not only the Protestants of these Kingdoms but likewise of all Europe and that we must all have expected the same usage our Brethren met with in France Nor could our Kings Promises and Engagements be any greater assurances to us than those of the French King were to his Subjects It is observable that King James was more than ordinarily liberal in his Promises and Declarations of favour towards Protestants He boasted in a Declaration sent to England and dispersed by his Friends there dated May 8. 1689. at Dublin That his Protestant Subjects their Religion Priviledges and Properties were his especial care since he came into Ireland He often professed that he made no distinction between them and Roman Catholicks and both he here and his Party there did much extol his kind dealings with his Protestants in Ireland What those dealings truly were I shall have occasion to shew the representation of them made in England by him and his Party was no less false than his Promises were unsincere it being plain he had a reserve in them all It is a maxim as I take it in Law that if the King be deceived in his Grant though it pass the Great Seal yet it is void much more must all his verbal Promises be void if he be deceived in them Now if we consider who were the Directors of the Kings Conscience we ought not to wonder that he made no great scruple to evade them Doctor Cartwright one of his Instruments gives us a right notion of King James's Promises in his Sermon at Rippon where in effect he tells us that the Kings Promises are Donatives and ought not to be too strictly examined or urged and that we must leave his Majesty to explain his own meaning in them this Gloss pleased King James so well that he rewarded the Author with the Bishoprick of Chester though very unfit for that Character and shewed in all his actions that he meant to proceed accordingly and the humour run through the whole party whenever they were at a pinch and under a necessity of serving themselves by the assistance or credulity of Protestants they promised them fair and stuck at no terms with them but when their turn was served they would not allow us to mention their promise much less to challenge the performance 2. It plainly appeared that it was not in King James's power if he had been disposed himself to perform his promises to us The Priests told us that they would have our Churches and our Tyths and that the King had nothing to do with them and they were as good as their words nor could his Majesty upon trial hinder them One Mr. Moore preached before the King in Christs Church in the beginning of the year 1690. his Sermon gave great offence he told his Majesty that he did not do justice to the Church and Churchmen and amongst other things said that Kings ought to consult Clergymen in their temporal affairs the Clergy having a temporal as well as a spiritual right in the
bounty yet retained in them the same Principles of Popery that at first stirred them up to Rebellion and to Massacre their fellow Subjects and having besides this their old hatred to the English new edged and heated by seeing the Conquerors possest of the Estates which they themselves by their Rebellion and Cruelty had lost they from time to time let us see their hopes and wishes of Revenge to which the favour they found at the English Court under the shelter of the late Queen Mother and the prospect of the Duke of Yorks's coming to the Crown gave foundation and encouragement Neither could they hide their resentments so as to prevent a just fear and jealousie of them in the Protestants who had so lately and in so signal a manner suffered by them in all their dearest Interests yet these were the persons whom King James chose for his Ministers and Officers with whom he resolved to trust the Employments the strong Holds the Arms and Justice of the Nation a thing so extravagant that we challenge any one to shew a parallel case in any History No body would ever have taken the Arms and Courts of Justice out of the Conquerors hands and put them into the hands of the Conquered exasperated by the loss of their Honours Liberties and Estates except he had a mind they should revenge themselves and recover all that they had lost before and they had been manifestly wanting to their own Interest if they had slipt this opportunity If they hated us so much in 1641 that without provocation and whilst in possession of theâ— Estates they rose as one Man and attempted to destroy us if they were so set on it that they ventured to do it without Arms Discipline or Authority on their side and where the hazard was so great that it was ten to one if they succeeded what could we expect they should do now when provoked to the heighth by the loss of their Estates when Armed Disciplined and entrusted with all the places of Strength Power and Profit in the Kingdom This alone is a Demonstration that the King who thus put us in the power of our inveterate and exasperated Enemies either was extremely mistaken in his Measures or designed our destruction I am sure we must have been destroyed if God had not prevented it almost by a Miracle 2. It is a Maxim in our Law that the King can do no wrong because he executeth nothing in his own person but has Officers appointed by Law to excute his Commands who are obliged not to obey him if he command any thing that is illegal If any Officer obey him in such unlawful Commands it is at his own peril and he is accountable for it the Kings Command being no excuse or protection to any Man for his doing an illegal thing Whilst therefore the King Employs only persons amenable to the Laws that have a value for their Honor for the Liberty of their Country and the Publick Good and have Estates to answer for what wrong they do to the Subjects in executing their Offices there is no great danger of his doing much harm to his People though his intentions were ever so mischievous against them it being the great security of the Subjects and restraint on the Officers of the King that they cannot do any wrong but the injured person has his remedy against them by Law 3. This I remember is all the Humane security Doctor Hicks in his Jovian allows us to preserve our Liberties c. against a tyrannous King And he supposes it so effectual a bar to all attempts of this Nature that he pronounces it impossible for our King to turn Tyrant But the event has sufficiently confuted his surmise and shewn not only the possibility but the actual performance of what he supposes impossible for King James made it his business to find out and actually pitched on a Set of Officers and Instruments that as he expresses it in one of his Declarations would obey him without reserve against whom the Current of the Law was stopt and who were in no condition to make amends for the mischiefs they did all which will appear if I make out 1. That they were Men of little or no Fortunes 2. Unable and unsufficient to discharge the Offices committed to their Trust. 3. That many of them were Men of such loose Principles and Morals that they could not be supposed to stick at any wickedness which was for their Interest 4. That their Inclination and Genius led them to destroy the Laws Liberty and Religion of the Kingdom 5. That most of them were unqualified by Law for the Offices into which they were placed and therefore could not be supposed to study the preservation of those Laws in defiance of which they acted Now if it appears that these were the qualifications of most of King James's Officers and Instruments in Ireland I suppose it will be a further Demonstration of his Intentions and of what we were to expect from him SECT V. I. That the Officers employed by King James were Men generally of little or no Fortune 1. I Suppose the true Reason why one Man is allowed to possess a greater Estate in a Common-wealth than another and to maintain himself by the Labor of other People is that he may be at leisure to attend the publick Business of his Country and that having such a considerable Stock in the common Bottom he may be the more careful to preserve it from sinking Out of such Men therefore of Fortune and Interest every wise and well designing King will supply himself with Officers For their Interest will help to support him and will procure his Commands Obedience and their Fortunes will secure the Subjects from being injured by them their Estates being Pawns to the Publick for their good Behaviour and Reprizals to those they have injured But for this very Reason King James generally employed Men of little or no Fortunes and very often the Scum and Rascality of the World This made him so fond of the Irish who had lost their Estates who depended wholly on him and had no other possibility of subsisting but by espousing his Interest and serving him without reserve I cannot blame them for being ready to embrace the Offer but it was certainly very impolitickly done or an indication of an ill Design in him to employ and espouse Men of such ruined and broken Fortunes I have put into the Appendix a List of the Civil Officers of the Collonels and Lieutenant-Collonels of his Regiments and of the principal persons that he brought along with him from France so far as I could gather them up and it will appear upon view that very few of them were Men of clear Estates and most had no pretence to any at all The Sheriffs and Deputy Lieutenants of Counties were generally poor and mean people many of them had been Servants in the meanest condition to Protestants who if they injured any
and the old petty Tyrants that claimed not only a Right to all his Tenant's Substance but likewise a power over his life 3. But many of the old Landlords lost their Estates by Outlawries and Attainders for their Rebellion in the year 1641 and for their murthering the Protestants at that time Many of them had sold their Estates and some had mortgaged them for more than their value two or three times to several persons a Practice very common in Ireland but it is observable that it is the humor of these People to count an Estate their own still tho they have sold it on the most valuable Considerations or have been turned out of it by the most regular Proceedings of Justice so that they reckon every Estate theirs that either they or their Ancestors had at any time in their possession no matter how many years ago And by their pretended Title and Gentility they have such an influence on the poor Tenants of their own Nation and Religion who live on those Lands that these Tenants look on them still tho out of possession of their Estates as a kind of Landlords maintain them after a fashion in Idleness and entertain them in their Coshering Manner These Vagabonds reckoned themselves great Gentlemen and that it would be a great Disparagement to them to betake themselves to any Calling Trade or Way of Industry and therefore either supported themselves by stealing and torying or oppressing the poor Farmers and exacting some kind of Maintenance either from their Clans and Septs or from those that lived on the Estates to which they pretended And these pretended Gentlemen together with the numerous Coshering Popish Clergy that lived much after the same manner were the two greatest Grievances of the Kingdom and more especially hindered its Settlement and Happiness The Laws of England were intolerable to them both nor could they subsist under them 4. As to the Popish Landlords who yet retained their Estates it put them out of all patience to find that the Bodough their Tenant so as they call the meaner sort of People should have equal Justice against them as well as against his Fellow Churl that a Landlord should be called to an account for killing or robbing his Tenant or ravishing his Daughter seemed to them an unreasonable Hardship It was insufferable to Men that had been used to no Law but their own Will to be levelled with the meanest in the Administration of Justice and every time they were crossed by a Tenant that would not patiently bear their Impositions they cursed in their Hearts the Laws of England and called to mind the glorious Days of their Ancestors who with a Word of their Mouths could hang or ruin which of their Dependents they pleased and had in themselves the power of Peace and War 5. This Humor in the Gentry of Ireland has from time to time been their Ruin and engaged them in frequent Rebellions being impatient of the Restraint the Laws of England put on their Power tho they enjoyed their Estates and they still watched an opportunity to restore themselves to their petty Tyrannies and were ready to buy the Reftitution of them at any rate The other sort of Gentlemen I mentioned as they called themselves who were outed of their Estates as well as of their Power by the same Laws hated them yet worse and their Clergy pushed them on with all the Arguments that ignorant Zeal or Interest could suggest insomuch that all sober Men as well as Protestants reckoned these the sworn Enemies of the Laws and Liberties of the Kingdom and were assured that they would stick at no conditions to destroy them their Interest Inclination and Principles all concurring to engage them to do it 6. Now these very Men were the Officers and Instruments King James employed and trusted above all others He espoused their Interest from the time that he had thoughts of the Crown they were his Favourites and Confidents and to provide for them he turned his English and Protestant Subjects first out of the Army then out of their Civil Trusts and Employments and lastly out of their Fortunes and Estates He knew very well that the Tempers and Genius of those Men were at enmity to the Laws and fitted for that Constitution of Slavery under which he designed to bring the Kingdoms He found that none were more fawning to their Superiors than they nor did any flatter with more Meanness and Servility and according to the nature of such People none are more insolent and tyrannous to their Inferiors And this was the reason that they were so dear to King James and that he preferred and trusted them rather than his Protestant and English Subjects The Bargain between him and them was plainly this restore us to our former Power Estates and Religion and we will serve you as you please in your own way An Expression that King James and all his Creatures often used and were very fond of 7. These People found that the King 's Legal Power could never restore them to the condition at which they aimed that the Power and Station they desired was absolutely contrary to the Laws in being and that no Legal Parliament would ever alter the Laws and Constitution of the Kingdom to gratifie them No wonder therefore if they espoused and promoted an absolute and despotick Power in the King and if he and they concurred so heartily to introduce it To do them Justice they made no Secret of it but professed it publickly and on all occasions and accordingly practised it in their several Stations They reckoned and called every one a Whig and Rebel that talked of any other Law than the King's Pleasure They were liberal of their Curses and Imprecations on all occasions but they exceeded and became outrageous against any one that durst alledge that their Proceedings were against Law Damn your Laws was frequently their word it is the Kings pleasure it should be so we know no reason why our King should not be as absolute as the King of France and we will make him so before we have done Nay so extravagant were many of them that they would swear with repeated Or ths that all Protestants were Rebels because they would not be of the King's Religion An Expression I suppose they learned from the French Dragoons 8. Some would undertake to argue the Case with such as seemed more moderate amongst them and put them in mind of the possibility of the Change of the Government and that then the Argument would be good against themselves but they had not patience to hear any such thing mentioned And they generally swore with the most bloody Oaths and bitter Imprecations that they would never subject themselves to any King that was not of their own Religion and that they would lose the last drop of their Blood rather than part with the Sword and Power put into their Hands on any consideration whatsoever These were not the Discourses of one or
Neighbours Cities especially Dublin encreased exceedingly Gentlemens Seats were built or building every where and Parks Enclosures and other Ornaments were carefully promoted insomuch that many places of the Kingdom equalled the Improvements of England The Papists themselves where Rancour Pride or Laziness did not hinder them lived happily and a great many of them got considerable Estates either by Traffick by the Law or by other Arts and Industry 2. There was a free Liberty of Conscience by connivence tho not by the Law and the King's Revenue encreased proportionably to the Kingdom 's Advance in Wealth and was every day growing it amounted to more than three hundred thousand pounds per annum a Sum sufficient to defray all the Expence of the Crown and to return yearly a considerable Sum into England to which this Nation had formerly been a constant Expence If King James had minded either his own Interest or the Kingdoms he would not have interrupted this happy Condition But the Protestants found that neither this nor the Services of any towards him nor his own good Nature were Barrs sufficient to secure them from Destruction 2. It is certainly the Interest of all Kings to govern their Subjects with Justice and Equity if therefore they understood or would mind their true Interest no King would ruin any of his Subjects but it often happens that either Men are so weak that they do not understand their Interest or else so little at their own Command that some foolish Passion or Humour sways them more than all the Interest in the World and from these proceeds all the ill Government which has ruined so many Kingdoms Now King James was so bent on gaining an absolute Power over the Lives and Liberties of his Subjects and on introducing his Religion that he valued no Interest when it came in competition with those 3. Every Body that knew King James's Interest and the true Interest of his Kingdoms knew that it concerned him to keep fair with Protestants especially with that party who were most devoted to him and had set the Crown on his Head and this had been in the Opinion of thinking Men the most effectual way to inlarge his Power and introduce his Religion but because it did not suit with the Methods his bigotted Counsellors had proposed he took a Course directly contrary to his Interest and seemed to take a peculiar pleasure in affronting and oppressing those very Men whom in Interest he was most concerned to cherish and support His Proceeding thus in England was visibly the Cause of his Ruin he had left himself no Friend to stand by him when he stood in greatest need of them Upon his coming to Ireland the Protestants had entertained some favourable Hopes that he would have seen and been convinced of his Error and would now at last govern himself by other measures it was manifestly his Interest to have done so and nothing in probability could have allayed the Heats of England and Scotland so much as his Justice and Kindness to the Protestants of Ireland nor could any thing have had so much the Appearance of an Answer to those many and evident Arguments by which they demonstrated his destructive Designs against those Kingdoms as to have had it to say that in Ireland where it was in his Power he was far from doing what they surmised he intended to do in England or if he had ever any such intentions it was plain he had now altered them These things were laid before him by some that wish'd well to his Affairs and had more Prudence than his furious and bigotted Counsellors and sometimes they seemed to make Impressions on him but the Priests and needy Courtiers who had swallowed in their Imaginations the Spoils and Estates of the Protestants of England as well as of Ireland could not endure to hear of this They seemed mightily afraid lest he should be restored to his Throne by consent of his Protestant Subjects For if so said they we know it will be on so strict Conditions that we shall gain but little by it it will not be in his power to gratifie us And not only they but the Irish in general likewise endeavoured to make his Restitution by way of Articles or Peace impracticable and impossible A Design so extremely foolish that it is strange any should be found so sillily wicked as to promote it or that King James should be so imposed on as to hearken to it and yet it is certain he did at least at some times entertain it and was heard to express himself to one that pressed him to Moderation to Protestants on this account that he never expected to get into England but with Fire and Sword However his Counsellors were not so weak but they saw what disadvantage his dealing with the Protestants had on his Interest in England and therefore they took care to conceal it as much as possible they stopped all Intercourse as far as they could with England they had a party to cry up the mildness of King James's Government towards the Protestants to applaud the Ease the Plenty the Security in which they lived and to run down and discredit all Relations to the contrary that came from Ireland These endeavoured to perswade the World that there was no such thing as a Bill of Attainder or of Repeal no Act taking away the Preferments or Maintenance of the Clergy nor any Imprisonment or Plundering of Protestants no taking away of Goods by private Orders of the King or levying of Monies by Proclamations In short they did that which on all occasions is the Practice and indeed Support of Popery They endeavoured to face down plain matter of Fact with Forehead and Confidence and to perswade the World that all these were mere Forgeries of King James's Enemies As many as believed these Allegations of theirs and were persuaded by them that the Protestants of Ireland were well used by King James were inclined to favour him a certain sign that if they had been really well used by him it would have gotten him many Friends and perhaps reconciled some of his worst Enemies But the Design entertained by him and his Party required the Ruin of Protestants and of their Religion whereas his Interest required that it should not be believed that he designed either and therefore Care was taken to prosecute the Design with all eagerness and deny the Matter of Fact with all impudence and his Majesty took care to promote both for he ruined the Protestants of Ireland by his Acts of Parliament and by the other Methods we shall hereafter speak of and by his Proclamations sent privately into England to his Partisans there assured the World that the Protestant Religion and Interest were his special care and that he had secured them against their Enemies It was his Interest to have done as well as pretended this but the carrying on his Design was so much in his Thoughts that he chose to sacrifice his
prevail all that could be obtained was a Clause implying that the Commissioners that should be appointed to execute the Act should set him out a Reprizal under the same Limitations under which he held the Town and Lands of Mollingar which as one of the House of Commons expressed it was a Mouthful of Moonshine So little regard was had to the Services or Merits of Protestants 6. And they had no reason to expect it should be otherwise for there was no regard had to the most considerable Papists where their Interest interfered with the general Design It was resolved to destroy the Act of Settlement the Foundation of the English and Protestant Interest in Ireland This brought along with it Destruction to many Papists that held Estates under it which they had purchased since the year 1662 as well as to Protestants Those Papists were very numerous and more wealthy than the rest especially in Connaught and they were likewise very zealous for King James and many of them in his actual Service and venturing their Lives for him at the time of passing the Act of Repeal yet this did not hinder him from giving away their Estates by that Act to the old Proprietors In short if serving King James truly and faithfully even to their own prejudice whilst it was for his Advantage and his Circumstances needed their Service could have merited his Favour most Protestants had supererogated but all this passed for nothing with him he would be served his own way that is he would have Protestants been active to destroy their Properties Liberty and Religion he would have had them lend their Hands to tie the Chains of Slavery for them and their Posterity to which they had already contributed too far to oblige his Humor both before and after his coming to the Crown against the common Interest of the Kingdom Nothing less than the same blind Obedience would serve him in the State which his Clergy require in the Church which we would not by any means pay him and therefore it was in vain for us to think of preserving our selves by any Merit or Service we could render him he did not think any thing a Protestant could do with a good Conscience to be a Service And if we did all was required yet there never wanted persons about his Majesty who had Malice enough towards us and Interest enough with him to misrepresent our most meritorious Actions 8. Nor was the good Nature and merciful Disposition of King James any greater Security to the Protestants of Ireland than their own Merits towards him There are 't is true Kings in the World that have an absolute Power over the Lives and Liberties of their Subjects and yet govern them with such Justice and Mercy that they suffer very little inconveniency by it but the Examples of this kind are so very rare that it is ill trusting any one with such a Power King James's Partizans made it their Business to represent their Master as the most merciful and justest Prince in the World and then they railed at us that grudged to lay our own and our Posterities Lives and Liberties at his Feet Perhaps if he alone had been to have had the Disposal of them and would have followed his natural Inclinations we should not so much have feared to have trusted him but whilst he had such Ministers about him and embraced a Religion of such Principles as he professed we had no Reason to depend much on his natural Clemency or Inclination for these were sufficient to corrupt the best natured Man in the World 9. No doubt but Charles the Fifth of Germany was of as compassionate and generous a Nature as any Man yet that did not keep him from making havock of his Subjects on account of Religion besides all his Wars and Bloodshed to suppress the Reformation he destroyed by way of legal Process fifty thousand in the Inquisition a Barbarity I believe hardly equalled by Nero Francis the First of France was a Prince equal to any in Generosity and Nobleness of Nature and yet he made no less Havock and Destruction in his Dominions on the same Account The present French King is a Demonstration that neither Love of Glory nor of Interest neither Greatness of Mind nor Goodness of Nature are Antidotes against the Force of Romish Principles or can restrain the Prince that has throughly imbibed them from Blood and Persecution otherwise he would never have made himself infamous by such horrid Cruelties as he has committed on his Protestant Subjects or brought an indelible Blot on a Reign which he would fain have represented to be more glorious than any of his Predecessors It is not necessary that what has been said should bring in question the good Nature or merciful Temper of King James tho we confess we were unwilling to trust it too far We had before our Thoughts the Proceedings in the West of England where we saw his Clemency did not interpose but suffered more to be prosecuted tryed condemned and executed for that one Rebellion and yet it was not so considerable as many others than perhaps had suffered in that manner for many of the Rebellions since the Conquest We found that he consented to attaint above two thousand five hundred of the most considerable persons of this Kingdom and that his good Nature might not be a Temptation to pardon them he put it out of his power to do it by the same Act. After his coming into Ireland very few Pardon 's passed the Great Seal perhaps not three nor had many so much as the promise of a Pardon given them tho very many needed and desired it Many of the Country People who were not of the Army were brought up Prisoners they pleaded that they were not concerned in the Wars that they lived in their Houses and on their Farms and submitted only to the stronger without engaging in the Cause but all to no purpose they were used worse than the Soldiers who were Prisoners and suffered to starve in Jails if the Charity of their Fellow Protestants had not relieved them Many who were wronged and oppressed petitioned his Majesty for Redress but their Petitions were rejected at best mislaid and the Petitioners were so far from obtaining any Answer that they often could never hear what became of their Petitions 10. The chief Counsellors of the King were the Popish Clergy and the Descendents of such as had shed the Blood of so many Protestants in the year 1641 who then ruined and destroyed the Kingdom and made it a heap of Rubbish and a Slaughter-House and whilst he hearkened to the Suggestions and Councils of such it was not possible for him to exert his good Nature and Clemency towards us It was the continual Business of these Counsellors to incense the King against us to represent us as People unworthy of any Favour Humanity or Justice that we were all Rogues Villains and Traitors and not fit to be allowed
imposed on but contributed nothing to relieve us as we found to our Costs and the Protestant Judges and Burgesses finding that they were made Cyphers and Properties of themselves declined at last to Act in their Stations 5. Next to Chancery is the Kings Bench where Subjects are tryed for their Lives and Fortunes upon this was set Mr. Thomas Nugent made afterwards Baron of Riverstown the Son of one who had been Earl of Westmeath but had lost his Honor and Estate for being an Actor in the late Rebellion begun in 1641. This Mr. Nugent who had never been taken notice of at the Bar but for a more than ordinary Brogue on his Tongue as they call it and ignorance in the Law was pitched on by King James to judg whether the Outlawries against his Father and his fellow Rebels should be reversed and whether the Settlement of Ireland founded on those Outlawries should stand good It was a Demonstration to us what the King intended when he assigned us such a Chief Justice and indeed the Gentleman did not fail to answer the expectation conceived of him He reversed the Outlawries as fast as they came before him notwithstanding a Statute made in point against it and in all the Causes that ever came before him wherein the Plaintiffs and Defendants were Papist and Protestant I could not learn from the most diligent Observer that ever he gave Sentence for the latter Nay it is Shrewdly suspected that he went sharer in some considerable Causes and not only appeared for them on the Bench but also secretly incouraged and fomented them Before him a Deed should be judged Forged or not Forged according as it served a Popish Interest And a Protestant needed no more to gain a Cause against another Protestant than to turn Papist which manifestly appear'd in Sir Gregory Birns Case who merely by turning Papist as is noted before in the midst of his Suit against Captain Robert Fitz Gerald got a Deed condemned of Forgery and recovered five or six hundred pounds per annum notwithstanding Mr. Daniel Birn his Father some years before for pretending it was Forged had been Sued in an Action of the Case and forced to pay two hundred pound damages and though there appeared in Court a Bond under Birns Hand obliging him to pay two hundred pound to the Witnesses in case they should prove Captain Fitz Geralds Deed to be Forged yet the proof was accepted But these were common things in this Court and the mischief had been much greater had not a Writ of Error lyen from his Court to the Kings Bench in England In one thing more he signalized himself it was by committing and prosecuting people for feigned Offences and Treasons and by countenancing and encouraging and after discovery protecting false Witnesses against Protestants Many were brought in danger of their Lives by his contrivances and when the accused were acquitted on Tryal by a palpable Demonstration that the Witnesses were Perjured he declared that they neither could nor should be Prosecuted for they only sware for the King and he believed the accused persons guilty though it could not be proved In short he shewed all the venom and rigour against them he could he was set up to destroy them and he went as far in it as his power could reach his weakness not his inclination hindred him from carrying it farther It is not imaginable by any that have not seen and heard him how furiously and partially he was bent against Protestants it may be guessed how he stood inclined to them by the great Hand he had in promoting the Bill of Attainder and the Bill to vest all Absentees Goods in the King whereby much the greater part of the Protestants of Ireland lost all their Estates Personal and Real of which we shall speak more hereafter He was assisted on the Bench by Sir Bryan ô Neal as puny Judg a weak Man that had nothing to recommend him but Venom and Zeal being otherwise disabled both in his Reason and Body Only he had the faculty to do what he was bid especially when it suited with his own inveteracy against Englishmen and Protestants This Character may seem rigid but as many as knew him will not think it exceeds 6. The next Court for business though not for Precedence is the Exchequer in which all Actions wherein the Kings Revenue or any other Mans Estate is concerned may be tryed From this Court no Writ of Error lies in England so they were free here from that Check which was so troublesom to them in other Courts Upon this consideration it was that the whole business of the Kingdom so far as it concerned them was brought into this Court though not so proper for it Here were brought all Actions of Trespasses and Ejectments concerning Estates all Quo Warranto's against Corporations and Scire Facias's about Offices and they thought themselves concerned to have an able Man and one throughly Cordial to their Interest for the Chief Judg in it for if he had wanted Sense or Law though willing as they found by Experience in some of the other Courts he might have been unable to serve them in all Cases They therefore fixed on Mr. Stephen Rice afterward Sir Stephen who had formerly been noted for a Rook and Gamester at the Inns of Court He was to give him his due a Man of the best Sense amongst them well enough versed in the Law but most signal for his inveteracy against the Protestant Interest and Settlement of Ireland having been often heard to say before he was a Judg that he would drive a Coach and Six Horses through the Act of Settlement upon which both depended And before that Act was Repealed in their pretended Parliament he declared on the Bench that it was against Natural Equity and could not oblige This Man did King James choose for Chief Baron and for the final determination of all the Suits that lay between Protestants and Papists either in Common-Law or Equity And it is no hard matter to conjecture what success the Protestants met with in their Suits before a Judg that declared as he did that they should have no favour but Summum jus that is the utmost rigour of the Law Immediately his Court was filled with Popish Plaintiffs every one that had a forged Deed or a false Witness met with Favour and Countenance from him and he knowing that they could not bring his Sentences into England to be re-examined there acted as a Man that feared no after Account or Reckoning It was some considerable time before he would allow a Writ of Error into the Exchequer Chamber though that was in effect to themselves and when it was allowed it was to little purpose before such Judges It was before him all the Charters of the Kingdom were damned and that in a Term or two in such a manner that proved him a Man of Dispatch though not of Justice If he had been left alone it was
really believed that in few years he would by some contrivance or other have given away most of the Protestants Estates in Ireland without troubling a Parliament to Attaint them which was a more compendious but not a more certain way to destroy them than the Methods he took It was he that without Hearing after he had Dissolved the Corporations by giving Sentence against their Charters declared void all the Leases of Lands or of Perquisites made by them though long before their Dissolution and on very good considerations and thereupon outed several Protestants of their Leases but it were endless to mention all the Oppressions and unjust proceedings of this Court it were in effect to transcribe the Records of it Let me only observe that the Chief Baron was assisted by Sir Henry Lynch as Second Baron who came indeed short of him in Parts but yielded nothing to him in Malice to the Protestant Religion and Interest 7. The Court of Common Pleas had little to do the business so far as concerned the Protestants and Papists was intirely carried out of it to the Kings Bench or Exchequer and therefore they permitted the Lord Chief Justice Keating still to sit in it but Pinioned with two of their own sort that if any thing should chance to come before him he might be out-voted by them The truth is they were jealous of this Court not only because a Protestant was Chief Justice in it but likewise because Judg Dally sat as puny Judg who though a Roman Catholick yet understood the Common-Law so well and behaved himself so impartially that they did not care to bring their Causes before him so much did they dread the prospect of Justice though before Judges that were of their own Party and Persuasion 8. The Circuits are an extention of the Courts whereby Justice is carried into the Country these were managed much at the same rate with the Courts and where the Sheriff and Judg were both Papists it is not difficult to guess what Justice Protestants must expect what packing of Juries there was amongst them and how deeply the Judges themselves were concerned in such Practices is evident to all that had any Concerns in the Country at that time 9. It will be requisite to say something of the Attourney General which King James made instead of Sir William Domvile whom he turned out after near thirty years supplying the place but he was a Protestant and would not consent to reverse the Popish Outlawries nor to the other Methods they took to destroy the Settlement of Ireland and therefore he was laid aside In his place King James substituted Mr. Richard Nagle whom he afterwards Knighted and made Secretary of State he was at first designed for a Clergy-Man and educated amongst the Jesuits but afterwards betook himself to the Study of the Law in which he arrived to a good Perfection and was employed by many Protestants so that he knew the weak part of most of their Titles Every Body knows how great a part the Attorney General has in the Administration of Justice it being his Office to prosecute and in his power to stop any Suit wherein the King is concerned How he used this Power will appear in one instance tho many may be given One Fitz Gerald of Tycrohan the Heir of a forfeiting Papist had a Suit for a great Estate against Sir William Petty it was tryed in the Exchequer before Chief Baron Rice and Fitz Gerald carried the Cause by the Perjury of two Friars and a Woman who swore a person to be dead in Spain and themselves to be present at his Burial upon whose Life Sir William's Title depended This person soon after appeared to be alive and is so still for ought we know and his being alive was so notorious and manifest that the Attorney General could not deny it Sir William's Counsel and Lawyers designed to indict the Friars and Woman for their Perjury but the Grand Jury refused to find the Bill and I was credibly informed that the Attorney General said that if they did not desist he would enter a Noli prosequi It is certain he refused to prosecute it and it was imputed to his Contrivance that they escaped By such means the Course of Justice was stopped to Protestants and the like Tenderness the Courts generally shewed to Perjurers when the Perjury served their Interest And sure the Protestants were in an ill case whose Lives and Fortunes lay at the Mercy of such Judges and Juries and they must conclude that nothing less than Destruction was designed for them by a King who put them under such Administrators of Justice The same Sir Richard Nagle was the Speaker of the House of Commons in their pretended Parliament and had the chief Hand in drawing up their Acts King James confided chiefly in him and the Acts of Repeal and Attainder were looked on as his Work in which his Malice and Jesuitical Principles prevailed so far that he was not content to out two Thirds of the Protestant Gentlemen of their Estates by the Act of Repeal by which all Estates acquired since 1641 were taken away and to attaint most of those that had old Estates by the Bill of Attainder But to make sure Work he put it out of the King's Power to pardon them therein betraying the King's Prerogative as the King himself told him when he discovered it to him Of which and of him we shall have occasion to give a further account hereafter 10. Into such Hands as we have been speaking of the Administration of Justice and of the Laws was put which were so far from preventing our Ruin that they were made the Means and Instruments thereof and it had been much better for us to have had no Laws at all and been left to our natural Defence than to be cheated into a necessity of Submission by Laws that were executed only to punish and not to defend us 11. It was common for some of those that served King James to come upon the Exchange and without any reason or provocation to fall upon Protestant Gentlemen if they looked a little more fashionable than other people and beat them One was thus beaten with a Cane severely before the Gentleman was aware he was advised for an Experiment to indict the Ruffian that used him thus to see what protection the Law would give us after they had taken away our Swords but the Grand Jury did not think it worth while to trouble the Courts with redressing the Grievances of Protestants and so would not find the Bill A Merchant in Thomas street Dublin found a Fellow that had broken into his Ware house and was conveying his Goods out at the Window to his Fellow Soldiers that stood in the Street to receive them he seised him and brought an Indictment against him for Felony but the Jury acquitted him and then he brought his Action against the Merchant for false Imprisonment and Slander and it cost a good Sum
did worse that is betrayed it by their Compliance whilst yet they profest it Many who would not be guilty of such servility were turned out even from the mean Employments of a High or Petty Constable of a Goalour or Turn-Key of all which it were easie to give Examples but the thing being Universal makes that unnecessary Even these mean Employments were now counted too good for Protestants and all this contrary to the express Letter of the Law which admitted none but such as would take the Oath of Supremacy to any Office but they took a peculiar Pleasure to act in contempt and despite of the Laws and it seemed to them a kind of Conquest to turn a Man out of his Employment Office or Freehold contrary to Law In the mean time it was a melancholy thing for Protestants to live under such illegal Officers and have their Lives Estates and Liberties at the mercy of Sheriffs Justices and Juries some of whose Fathers or nearest Relations they had either hanged for Thieving Robbery and Murthering or killed in the very Act of Torying 5. I reckon as a fourth sort of Officers in the Kingdom such as were of the Privy-Council which in Ireland is a great part of the Constitution and has considerable Privileges and Power annexed to it Regularly no Act of Parliament can pass in Ireland till the chief Governor and Privy-Council do first certifie the Causes and Reasons of it It was therefore no less than necessary that King James should model this to his mind and he quickly ordered it so that the Papists made the majority in it and whereas before it was a Refuge and Sanctuary to the oppressed it now became a most effectual Instrument to strengthen the Popish Interest and give Reputation to their Proceedings We may guess what kind of Government King James designed when he was attended with such a Council and yet it is certain even some of these who were Protestants would have been turned out if they had not absented themselves and declined appearing at the Board but whether they appeared or no was of no consideration since it is plain they could do Protestants little service SECT V. Fourthly King James's ordering Corporations was an effectual means to destroy his Protestant Subjects and to alter the very Nature of the Government 1. WOever knows the Constitution of England and Ireland must observe that the Subjects have no other security for their Liberties Properties and Lives except the Interest they have of choosing their own Representatives in Parliament This is the only Barrier they have against the Encroachments of their Governor Take it away and they are as absolute Slaves to the Kings Will and as miserable as the Peasants in France Whoever therefore goes about to deprive them of this Right utterly destroys the very Constitution and Foundation of the Government Now the Protestants of Ireland finding the necessity of securing this right in their own Hands to preserve the Kingdom in Prosperity and Peace had procured many Corporations to be Founded and built many considerable Corporate Towns at their own Cost and Charges They thought it reasonable to keep these in their own Hands as being the Foundation of the Legislative power and therefore secluded Papists as Enemies to the English Interest in Ireland from Freedom and Votes in them by the very Foundation and Rules of planting them This Caution they extended by a Law to all other Corporations in the Kingdom excluding Papists likewise from them which they justly did if we remember that these Papists had forfeited their Right in them by their Rebellion in 1641 and by their having turned those Towns where they had Interest into Nests of Traitors against the King and into places of Refuge for the Murtherers of the English insomuch that it cost England some Millions to reduce them again into Obedience witness Killkenny Waterford Galway Lymerick and every other place where they had power to do it Add to this that generally the trading industrious Men of the Kingdom were Protestants who had built most of the Corporate Towns above thirty at once in King James the First 's time and a great part of the Freeholds of the Kingdom did also belong to Men of the same Religion insomuch that if a fair Election had been allowed in probability no Papist could have carryed it in any one County of Ireland All which considered it was but reasonable that the Protestants that had by so much Blood and Treasure brought the Kingdom into subjection to the Laws of England and planted it in such a manner as to render it worth the Governing by the King should be secured of their Representatives in Parliament especially when out of their great Loyalty and Confidence in the Kings kind intention to them they by some new Rules had condescended that none should Officiate as Majors Portrieves Magistrates or Sheriffs in the chief Towns till approved by the Kings chief Governor for the time being Their yielding this to the King was a sufficient security one would have thought to the Royal Interest A great diminution of their Liberties and such as never was yielded before to any King but this would not serve King James to be Absolute he must have the intire Disposition of them and the Power to put in and turn out whom he pleased without troubling the Formalities of Law To bring them therefore to this it was resolved to Dissolve them all Tyrconnel knew that the Protestants would never give up their Charters without being compelled by Law and therefore he endeavoured to prevail with them to admit Papists to Freedom and Offices in them that by their means he might have them surrendred but the Resolution of Sir John Knox then Lord Mayor of Dublin and of the then Table of Aldermen spoiled that Design and forced the King to bring Quo Warranto's against them since they would not easily consent to destroy themselves 2. The Chief Baron Rice and the Attorney General Nagle were employed as the fittest Instruments to carry on this Work To prevent Writs of Error into England all these Quo Warranto's were brought in the Exchequer and in about two Terms Judgments were entred against most Charters Whereas if either Equity or Law had been regarded longer time ought to have been allowed in matters of such Consequence for the Defendants to draw up their Plea than the Chief Baron took to dispatch the whole Cause and seize their Franchises Attorney General Nagle plaid all the little Tricks that could be thought of and had an ordinary Attorney brought such Demurrers or Pleadings into Court in a common Cause as he did in this most weighty Affair of the Kingdom he would have received a publick Rebuke and been struck out of the Roll for his Knavery or ignorance After all there was not one Corporation found to have Forfeited by a Legal Tryal neither was any Crime or Cause of forfeiture objected against them yet the Chief Baron gave Judgment against
a hundred Charters or thereabouts upon such little Exceptions and pittiful Cavils that it must be the greatest affront to the understanding of Mankind to think to put such on them for Justice and the greatest profanation of the name of Law to endeavour to pass such Proceedings for Legal Admit that a Corporation which is an invisible Body in Law could do any thing to destroy its own being or that it were reasonable it should be divested of a particular Privilege which it has manifestly abused or when by alteration of Circumstances such a Privilegde becomes a Prejudice to the Publick as it sometimes happens Yet to Dissolve all the Corporations in a Kingdom without the least Reason or Pretence of abuse of Priviledge or Forfeiture to take advantage from the Ignorance of a Lawyer or the mistake of a Clerk nay to pretend these when really there is no such thing is such an abuse of the Kings Prerogative and the Law that it is enough to make the People oppressed by colour of them to hate both at least to wish the Administration of them in other Hands and this was clearly the Case of the Corporations in Ireland The City of Dublin was not allowed so much time to put in their Plea as was really sufficient to transcribe it as it ought to have been The Clerk mistakes the Date of one of their Charters they pray leave to mend it this is denyed them and the Chief Baron gives Judgment The same Term the Charter of Londonderry in which the City of London was so deeply concerned was condemned on a yet more frivolous Pretence upon which the Chief Baron gave Judgment against the Charter And upon the like wrangling Cavils were the rest dissolved except a few which were on Noblemens Estates Some of these Noblemen employed Roman Catholick Agents or Receivers who so managed their Estates for them as chiefly to encourage Papists and now became the Instruments to betray their Corporations Those Agents employed the Power and Interest they had amongst their Masters Tenants by Threats and Intrigues to procure Surrenders and by these means some few were influenced Thus one Potter a Papist employed as a Receiver by the Earl of Kildare betrayed his Lord and prevailed with Athy and some other Corporations on his Estate to Surrender 3. Whether they did not think fit to destroy the Charters upon their usual and trivial pretence of defective Pleading there they found out other Expedients without Tryal to destroy them And that was by granting a New Charter as in the Case of Bangor in the County of Down to such Men as the Attorney General thought fit who by the Sheriff should be put in Possession of the Government of the Town and then if the former Possessors thought themselves injured they might bring their Actions against the Intruders in the Tryal of which they had Reason to expect no more fairness than they found in the Proceedings against their Charters 4. This Contrivance of superseding a former Charter by granting a new one served to very good purpose There were many particular Charters granted to Corporations in the City of Dublin Such were the Corporations of Taylors Skinners Feltmakers c. where these refused to Surrender they got a few of the Trade to take out a new Charter by which Papists were constituted Masters and Wardens and as soon as they had taken it out they committed to Prison such of the ancient Members as would not submit to them 5. Every Body dreaded the Effects of these Proceedings the Gentry considered that they held their Estates by Patents from the King and the Title was no stronger than that of a Charter And if Men were outed of their Priviledges and Freedoms by such Tricks and Shaddows of Law they began to fear that one day or other the like might be found to void their Patents 6. As soon as the Corporations came to be supplied with new Charters it plainly appeared that no English or Protestant Freeman could expect a comfortable Life in Ireland for in the first place the Corporations were made absolute Slaves to the King's Will it being one Clause in all the new Charters that the King 's chief Governor should have power to turn out or put in whom he pleased without giving any Reason and without any Form of Legal Proceeding by which the Corporations were so much in the King's Power that he might with as much reason have named his Regiment of Guards a Free Parliament as the Burgesses return'd by such Elections The whole Kingdom had therefore reason to resent such Proceedings as being absolutely destructive to their Liberties but more especially the English Protestants for it plainly appeared in the second place that all this Regulation was more immediately designed for their Destruction The persons every where named for Aldermen and Burgesses in the new Charters being above two thirds Papists some few Protestants were kept in for form sake that they might not seem absolutely to discountenance them and to avoid discovering their Designs of turning them out of all but yet so few in comparison of the Papists that they were incapable of doing either good or hurt And when they saw that they must be insignificant they generally declined serving at all The Papists employed were commonly the most inveterate and exasperated persons against Protestants and their Interest that could be found Many of them never saw the Corporations for which they were named they were never concerned in Trade or Business many of them were named for several Corporations because they wanted Men qualified as they would have had them to make up the number of Aldermen or Burgesses Most of them were poor and mean and such whose very Names spake Barbarities 7. The Protestants foresaw very well what they were to expect from Corporations thus settled and a great many of the richest trading Citizens removed themselves and their Effects into England The Gentry likewise endeavoured to make Provisions for themselves there and such as could compass Money laid it out in England and fled after it to avoid the Storm they saw coming on Ireland The Truth is 't was intolerable to them to live under the Government of their Footmen and Servants which many must have done had they staid and they could not but dread a Parliament that should not only be Slaves to the King's Will who they saw was bent to settle Popery at any rate but which must consist of Members that they knew to be their inveterate and hereditary Enemies who would not stick to sacrifice the Liberties and Laws of the Kingdom to the King's Will so they might procure from him Revenge on the Protestants and turn them out of their Estates For what would they stick at that were so servile as to accept such precarious Charters They saw in this their own Ruin design'd and the Event has shewn that they were not mistaken perhaps no King in the World much less a King who had been obliged in
as the Lord Deputy against the Laws of the Kingdom and the Interest of the Nation had intrusted with Arms and Employments and that no Care was taken by him to prevent those Mischiefs but on the contrary the Robbers were secretly cherished and encouraged the Gentlemen in the North to prevent their own Ruin and the Ruin of all the Protestants of Ireland which they saw unavoidable entred into Associations to defend themselves from these Robbers their Associations did really reach no farther than this nor did they attempt any thing upon the Armed Robbers except in their own Defence when invaded and assaulted by them Insomuch that I could never hear of one act of Hostility committed wherein they were not on the Defensive Their crime then if any was only this they were not willing to suffer themselves to be robb'd and plundered as their Neighbours were without opposition but disarmed some of those who under colour of being King James's Soldiers destroyed the Country This was all the reason the Lord Deputy and Council had to call them Rebels and to charge them in their Proclamation dated March the 7th 1688 with actual Rebellion and with Killing and Murdering several of his Majesties Subjects and with Pillaging and Plundering the Country whereas it was notorious they never killed any whom they did not find actually Robbing to kill whom the Laws of the Kingdom not only indemnified them but likewise assigned them a Reward and for Plundering it is no less notorious that they preserved the whole Country within their Associations from being Pillaged when all the rest of Ireland was destroyed And their great care of themselves and their Country was the Crime which truly provoked the Lord Deputy and made him except from Pardon Twelve of the principal Estated Men in the North when he sent down Lieutenant General Hamilton with an Army which he tells us in the same Proclamation would inevitably occasion the total ruin and destruction of the North. 10. And lest there should be any Terms proposed or accepted by the People in the North and so that Country escape being Plundered and Undone he made all the haste he could to involve the Kingdom in Blood King James was every day expected from France and landed at Kinsale March the 12th but no Perswasions would prevail with the Lord Deputy to defer sending the Army to the North till the King came though he had good assurance given him by several who knew their Minds and Tempers that in all probability if King James himself appeared amongst them and offered them Terms they would have complyed with him at least so far as to submit quietly to his Government But it was the Lord Deputy's design to destroy the Protestants there as well as in the rest of the Kingdom and therefore he hasted to make the Parties irreconcilable by engaging them in Blood and by letting loose the Army to Spoil and Plunder The War therefore was entirely imputable to him and the Protestants were forced into it having no other choice than either to be undone without offering to make any Defence for themselves or else with their Arms in their Hands to try what they could do in their own Preservation 11. But it must be considered that Ireland is a Kingdom dependent on the Crown of England and part of the Inheritance thereof and therefore must follow its fate which it cannot decline without most apparent ruin to the English Interest in it Now King James having abdicated the Government of England and others being actually possessed of the Throne it was the business of the Protestants of Ireland to preserve themselves rather than dispute the Titles of Princes they were sure it was their Interest and their Duty to be subject to the Crown of England but whether King James was rightly intitled to that Crown is not so easily determinable by the common People No wonder therefore they declared for King William and his Queen whom they found actually in the Throne of England and own'd as rightful Possessors by those who had best reason to know rather than for King James who indeed pretended to it but with this disadvantage amongst many others that he was out of Possession and he had not used the Power when he was in possession so well that they should be desirous to restore him to it with the danger of their own ruin 12. They considered further that their defending themselves and those Places of which they were possest would in all probability very much contribute to save not only themselves but likewise the Three Kingdoms and the Protestant Interest in Europe to which it did certainly in some Measure contribute King James and his Party believed it and declared themselves to this effect and some of them were very liberal of their Curses on the Rebels in the North as they called them for this reason had said they the Rebels in the North joined with King James he had such a Party in England and Scotland which together with the Succours he might then have sent from Ireland and the assistance of the French King would in all probability have shaken the Government of England before it had been settled but the opposition of Enniskillin and Derry lost the opportunity that will not easily be retrieved How far this Conjecture of theirs was probable I leave it to the Reader what has happened since shews that it was not altogether groundless if the Design had taken the condition of Europe especially of the Protestants had been most deplorable but it pleased God to spoil all their Measures by the opposition made by a small Town Mann'd with People before that time ofâ— no extraordinary Reputation in the World for Arms Valour or Estates and who perhaps had never before seen an Enemy in Arms King James was pleased to call them a Rabble but it must be remembred to their Honour that they outdid in Conduct Courage and Resolution all his Experienced Generals To a Man that seriously reflects on it the thing must almost seem miraculous all Circumstances considered the rest of the Kingdom except Enniskillin had yielded without a Blow most of the chief Officers Gentlemen and Persons of Note Courage or Interest in the North had deserted their new rais'd Troops without Fighting the Succours designed for them from England came at the very time when the Town was ready to be invested and the Officers that came with those Succors as well as their own Officers were of opinion that the Place was not to be defended that they had neither Provision nor Necessaries to hold out a Siege The Officers therefore privately took a resolution to return for England and carried along with them most of the Gentlemen and Leaders of the Town without leaving any Governor or Instructions for the People what they were to do and without offering to make any conditions for them but neither this nor their extream want of Provision to which they were at last reduced nor the
consideration of their Friends whom their Enemies treated barbarously in their sight could prevail with them to give up themselves or their cause but by patience and resolution they wearied out their Enemies and instead of letting them make approaches to their Walls they enlarged their Out-works upon them and made them confess after a Siege of Fifteen Weeks that if the Walls of Derry had been made of Canvas they could not have taken it The same may be said of the People of Enniskillin who lived in a wild Country and untenable place surrounded with Enemies on every side and removed from almost all possibility of Succour being in the heart of Ireland yet they chose to run all Hazards and Extremities rather than trust their Faithless Enemies or contribute to the ruin of the Protestant Interest by yielding After almost all their Gentry of Estates or Note had left them or refused to joyn heartily with them they formed themselves into Parties and though in a manner without Arms and Ammunition yet by meer Resolution and Courage they worsted several Parties of the Enemy and almost naked recovered Arms and Ammunition out of their Hands and signalized themselves in many Engagements by which they not only saved themselves but likewise did considerable Service to the Protestants that were under the Power of King James for this Handful of Men by their frequent Incursions and carrying off Prisoners in every Engagement terrified even the Papists of Dublin into better Humour and more moderate Proceedings as to the Lives of Protestants that lived amongst them than perhaps they would otherwise have been inclined to They saw from this that their Game was not so sure as they imagined and the Prisoners taken by those of Enniskillin were Hostages for their Friends that lived in Dublin and the Humanity with which the Prisoners were used there was a Reproach on the Barbarity exercised by the other Party In short it appeared that it was neither Malice nor Factiousness that engaged them in Arms but meer Self-preservation and the Obligation of their Tenures and Plantations by which they were bound to keep Arms and Defend themselves and their Country from the power of the Popish Natives which were then Armed against them 13. But to return to the Lord Deputy's Proceedings in his new Levies in order to gain time and delude the Protestants he sent for the Lord Mountjoy out of the North after he had compounded the business of Derry and perswaded him to go with Chief Baron Rice to King James into France to represent to him the weakness of the Kingdom and the necessity to yield to the Time and wait a better opportunity to serve himself of his Irish Subjects The Lord Tyrconnel swore most solemnly that he was in earnest in this Message and that he knew the Court of France would oppose it with all their Power for said he that Court minds nothing but their own Interest and they would not care if Ireland were sunk to the Pit of Hell they are his own Words so they could give the Prince of Orange but Three Months diversion but he added if the King be perswaded to ruin his fastest Friends to do himself no Service only to gratify France he is neither so Merciful nor so Wise as I believe him to be If he recover England Ireland will fall to him in course but he can never expect to Conquer England by Ireland if he attempts it he ruins Ireland to do himself no kindness but rather to exasperate England the more against him and make his Restoration impossible and he intimated that if the King would not do it he would look on his Refusal to be forced on him by those in whose power he was and that he would think himself obliged to do it without his Consent 14. Every body told the Lord Mountjoy that this was all sham and trick and that the design was only to amuse the Protestants and get him who was the likeliest Man to head them out of the way But his Answer was that his going into France could have no influence on the Councils of England who were neither privy nor Parties to it and if they had a mind to reduce the Kingdom it was easy to do it without his Assistance that he must either go on this Message now the Deputy had put him upon it or enter into an actual War against him and against such as adhered to King Jame's Interest that he did not think it safe to do the latter having no order or encouragement from England but on the contrary all the Advice he received from thence was to be quiet and not to meddle that he was obliged to King James and neither Honour Conscience nor Gratitude would permit him in his present Circumstances to make a War on his own Authority against him whilst there was any possibility of doing the business without one Upon these considerations against the general Opinion of all the Protestants in Ireland he undertook the business and went away from Dublin about the Tenth of January 1688 having first had these general Concessions made him in behalf of the Protestants 1. That no more Commissions should be given out or new Men raised 2. That no more of the Army should be sent into the North 3. That none should be questioned for what was passed And 4. That no Private House should be garrison'd or disturb'd with Soldiers these he sent about with a Letter which will be found in the Appendix But he was no sooner gone but the Lord Deputy according to his usual Method of Falshood denyed these Concessions seemed mighty angry at the dispersing the Letter and refused to observe any of them The first News we heard from France was that the Lord Mountjoy was put into the Bastile which further exasperated the Protestants against King James and made them look on him as a Violater of Publick Faith to his Subjects As for the Lord Deputy this clearly ruined his Credit if ever he had any amongst them and they could never after be brought to give the least belief to what he said on the contrary they look'd on it as a sure sign that a thing was false if he earnestly affirmed it 15. But it was not yet in his power to master them he had not sufficiently Trained and Exercised his Men but as soon as he found that nothing was to be feared from England before the End of Summer and that he was assured King James would be with him soon he laid aside his Vizour and fell upon disarming them It was no difficult matter to do this for in the very beginning of King James's Reign the Protestant Militia had been dissolved and though they had bought their own Arms yet they were required to bring them into the Stores and they punctually obeyed the Order Such of the Protestant Army as remained in the Kingdom after their Cashiering were likewise without Arms being as I shewed before both disarmed and strip'd upon
not failing in any Punctilio of his Country Dragooning and he is supposed to have sent off for Frame to the value of 30000 l. in Mony Leather and other Commodities the Spoils of the Protestants in that Rich Town 7. The Parliament granted the King a Tax of 20000 l. per Month for thirteen Months which the Kingdom could hardly have paid if it had been in its most Flourishing Condition but they knew it would fall most heavy on the Protestants who must be forced to pay it out of their ready Mony having lost their Stocks generally by Plundering and deprived of their Rents and Incomes 2. Because the Protestants in and about Dublin had saved some Hides Tallow Wooll c. King James by pretence of his Prerogative Royal laid a Tax of 20000 l. per. Month for three Months on Chattels because the 20000 l. per Month granted by the Parliament was only on Lands This way of levying Mony did startle every Body the pretended Parliament was then in being and was adjourned till January 12. 1689. which happened to be about the very time when the King and his Council were upon this Project Some in the Council oppos'd it and pleaded the no necessity of using extraordinary ways of levying Mony when the King might have it in the ordinary way and further that it would give advantage to his Enemies and be an Argument of his affecting an Arbitrary Power but he was very angry with those that oppos'd it and told them That they had made him believe it was a Branch of his Prerogative to Levy Mony and If he could not do it he could do nothing Chancellor Fitton appear'd Zealously for it and 't was carried that the Mony should be raised but it being a new thing they were at a loss how to go about it at last they issued out a Proclamation dated February 4. 1689. wherein 't is ordered and declared That a Contribution of 20000 l. per Month for the space of three Months ending the last day of January last past shall be forthwith applotted laid in and levied upon the Personal Estates of all Sorts And the Applotment is order'd to be made by Commissioners to be nam'd by the King Who were to proceed according to Instructions forthwith to be published by him Albaville the Secretary of State thought it sufficient to send Letters signed only by himself in which he named and instructed the Commissioners but the Persons so named for Dublin judged this Authority insufficient and demur'd on the Execution till they had their Nomination and Instructions according to the Proclamation from the King himself under the Great Seal The King was heartily angry at them for this Demur and was hardly prevailed on to Issue a Commission under the Seal in the usual Forms as judging his Secretaries Letter a sufficient Warrant But at last the Commission was issued in which the Commissioners were named and impower'd to nominate Sub-Commissioners for every Barony in their respective Counties to make the Applotment of which Sub-Commissioners the High-Constable was to be one The Commissioners of Dublin and other Cities were not yet satisfied for their Counties had neither Baronies nor High-Constables and therefore the Commission could not be duly executed in them they therefore applied a new to the Lords of the Treasury for a more ample Commission which put the Lords and Attorney-General in as great a Passion as the King was in before and all the answer return'd to the Commissioners was That they should go about their Business without such frivolous Scruples or they should take a course with them The Commissioners being thus appointed were most of them Papists and the few Protestants that were named declin'd acting as much as they durst by which means the Papists had the applotting intirely in their own Hands and never fail'd to lay the greatest Burden on their Protestant Neighbours who in effect paid all Taxes that King James ever receiv'd in Ireland 3. The Papists raised a Militia and inasmuch as Protestants were not qualified to serve in it by the Proclamation which did not allow them to bear Arms they were assess'd at a certain Rate for the Maintenance of the Militia and sent to Prison if they refused to pay it The Tax was as great as either of the former amounting in the small Parish of St. Wâ—rburghs Dublin in which not above one half of the Protestant-dwellers were left to 900 l. per Annum 4. They pretended to make some small Ditches at the several Avenues of the Town and for these likewise the Protestants must pay and they tax'd them at what Rate they pleased Distraining or committing them to Goal if they refused to pay what was exacted or wanted Mony Before they form'd this Militia business into a Tax the Officers of the Militia went about Weekly for several Weeks and demanded and took what they pleased from every House with great Rigor committing those who disputed their Demands which was for the time it lasted a Heavy Burthen and a Prodigious Tax 5. Towards the middle of Winter 1689. their Forces were dispersed into their Winter-Quarters very few being left in Dublin it was most convenient to have such as remain'd in it quarter'd together at least it was judged unsafe to have them dispersed in Protestant Houses therefore they seiz'd on wast Houses and filled them with the Soldiers the rest they quarter'd in the Colledge Nevertheless that the Protestants might not escape Free they obliged them to send in Beds to the Soldiers but instead of Beds they took a Composition in Mony the Rate was from 24 s. to 5 l. for every House This fell intirely on the Protestants the Papists being conniv'd at and the Conditions were not generally made good to them after they paid for within two or three Months some had Soldiers quartered on them again tho while it lasted it must be confess'd it was a great Convenience and Ease to be rid of such Guests at any rate 6. All these Contrivances to get Mony from Protestants did indeed Impoverish them but by their Industry and Charity to one another they made a shift to subsist and to keep something in reserve but the Contrivance of making Brass Mony pass instead of Silver and at an equal Value with it was an utter and unavoidable Ruin to them It is true the Coining of Mony is a Prerogative of the Crown and the reason of its being so is to prevent its being adulterated the King's Honor and Interest being the Engagement and Security for the Coin that bears his Impression But sure the meaning was not that he should give a Value to what has no Value in it self otherwise the Cautiousness of our Forefathers was ridiculous who would not allow the King by his Prerogative to raise Mony either by Loan or Subsidy from the Subject since if it be allowed that he may set what value he pleases upon Brass he may have what he thinks fit from the Kingdom without
further reserv'd to prove a Correspondence against the few Estated Men that were in the Kingdom Lastly It was the end of Sept. 1688. before we heard any thing of the Prince of Orange's design to make a Descent into England and yet to have been in England or Scotland any time in the Month before or to have corresponded with any there is made Forfeiture of Estate by the Letter of this Statute 4. Least the Children and Descendents of the Protestants thus attainted who had Estates before 1641. should come in and claim them after the Death of the attainted Persons by virtue of Settlements made on valuable Considerations and upon Marriages all such Remainders and Reversions are cut off for there is an express Exception to all Remainders on such as are commonly call'd Plantation-lands and likewise to such Lands c. as are held by Grants from the Crown or upon Grants by Commissioners upon defective Titles It were too tedious to explain these several kinds of Tenures it is sufficient to let the Reader know that they comprehend all those Estates which were acquir'd by Protestants before the year 1641. Thus then the case stood with the Protestants if they purchased or acquired their Estates since the year 1641. out of any of the Lands then forfeited they were to lose them whether Guilty or Innocent by the Act of Repeal if their Estates were such as belong'd to Protestants before 1641. and consequently were what we call Old Interest then to have been in England or Scotland or to have corresponded with any of their Friends there or in the North since August 1. 1688. was a Forfeiture of Estate and a Bar for their Remainders for ever tho the Heirs had done nothing to divest themselves of the Estates derived to them by legal Settlements on valuable Considerations And here the Partiality of this Parliament is visible for there is a saving in the Act for all such Remainders as they thought might relate to any Papist whereas all the Remainders in which they did imagine Protestants could be concern'd are bar'd 5. There is indeed a promise of reprizing Purchasers in the Act of Repeal which was put in to qualifie the manifest Injustice of it and to satisfie the Clamors of several amongst themselves who were to lose their Estates by it as having purchased new interested Land But least any Protestant who staid in the Kingdom should hope for Benefit by this Clause or be repriz'd for the Lands he had purchased perhaps from a Papist they contrive a Clause in the latter end of the Act Whereby the King is enabled to gratifie Meriting Persons and to order the Commissioners to set forth Reprizals and likewise to appoint and ascertain where and what Lands should be set out to them By which the Protestants were excluded from all hopes of Reprizals for to be sure where any of them put in for a piece of Land there would never want a Meriting Papist to put in for the same and when it was left intirely to K. James which he would prefer of those two let the World judge what hope any Protestant could have of a Reprizal Thus when Sir Thomas Newcomen put in Proposals for a Custodiam in order to a Reprizal Mr. Robert Longfield a Convert and Clerk of the Quit-rents and Absentees Goods is said to have put his own Name to Sir Thomas's Proposal and to have got the Custodiam for himself 6. Lastly Some might think that tho near 3000 Protestants were attainted and the Estates of all the rest in a manner vested in the King yet this was only done in terrorem and that K. James never meant to take the Forfeiture To this I answer That it was not left in his power to pardon any that was attainted or whose Estate was vested in him by this Act this was if we believe his Majesty more than he knew when he pass'd it and was one reason why the Act of Attainder was made so great a Secret that no Copy could be gotten of it by any Protestant till the Easter after it was pass'd and then it was gotten by a meer accident We had from the beginning labor'd to get it and offer'd largely for a Copy but could not by any means prevail Chancellor Fitton keeping the Rolls lock'd up in his Closet till at last a Gentleman procur'd it by a Stratagem which was thus Sir Thomas Southwell had been condemned for High-Treason against King James amongst other Gentlemen at Gallway in March 1688. and attainted in the Act of Attainder also he continued a Prisoner till my Lord Seaforth became acquainted with him my Lord undertook to reconcile him to the King and to get his Pardon K. James promis'd it on the Earl's Application and order was given to draw up a Warrant for it The Gentleman I mentioned being a Lawyer and an Acquaintance of Sir Thomas's was employ'd to draw it up he immediately apprehended this to be a good opportunity to get a Copy of the Act of Attainder which he had labor'd for in vain before and which was kept from us by so much Injustice He told the Earl therefore and Sir Thomas what was the real Truth that he could not draw up an effectual Pardon except he saw the Act that attainted him Hereupon the Earl obtain'd an express order from the King to have a Copy deliver'd to him Thus I believe was the only Copy taken of it after it was inrolled it was taken for the use of a Papist and was lent to the Earl who was permitted to shew it to his Lawyer and accordingly left it with him only for one day who immediately imploy'd several Persons to Copy it and the Copy was sent by the first Opportunity into England The List of the Names of those that were attainted had been obtained the January before with difficulty the Commissioners in the Custom-house who seiz'd Absentees Goods and set their Estates could not do their Work without such a List and that which was Printed in England with some of the Acts of our Irish Parliament was coppied from thence but the Act it self could not then be procured and therefore was not Printed with them When the Lawyer had drawn up the Warrant for Sir Thomas's Pardon with a full Non obstante to the Act of Attainder the Earl brought it to the Attorney General Sir Richard Nagle to have a Fiant drawn the Attorney read it and with Indignation threw it aside the Earl began to expostulate with him for using the King's Warrant at that rate The Attorney told him That the King did not know what he had done that he had attempted to do a thing that was not in his power to do that if the Earl understood our Laws or had seen the Act of Attainder he would be satisfied that the King could not dispense with it My Lord answered That he understood Sense and Reason and that he was not a Stranger to the Act of Attainder Sir Richard would
not believe him till he shewed the Copy which much surpriz'd Sir Richard he began to enquire how his Lordship came by it and intimated that the Keepers of the Rolls were Treacherous in letting any one see it much more in letting a Copy of it go abroad His Lordship with good reason express'd his Admiration that an Act of Parliament should be made a Secret and the Laws upon the Observation of which the Lives and Fortunes of so many Men depended should be conceal'd with so much care from them At last the Attorny told him That he himself would draw up a Warrant for Sir Thomas Southwell's Pardon that should do his Business and get the King to Sign it But the Earl refused to accept his offer unless his Lawyer might first peruse it which being granted the Lawyer upon perusal found it to be such as would not hold in Law and intended only to delude him The Earl made new Application to King James and Sir Richard being sent for the King ask'd him why he did not prepare a Fiant for Sir Thomas Southwell's Pardon according to the Warrant sent to him He answered That his Majesty could not grant such a Pardon That his Majesty was only a Trustee for Forfeited Estates and could not Dispense with the Act that by an express Clause in it all Pardons that should be granted were declar'd void The King in some Passion told him That he hoped they did not intend to retrench his Prerogative Sir Richard replied That his Majesty had read the Act before he pass'd it The King answered He had betray'd him that he depended on him for drawing the Act and if he had drawn it so that there was no room for Dispensing and Pardoning he had been false to him or words to that effect Thus the Matter ended and Sir Thomas went into Scotland with my Lord Seaforth without being able to obtain his Pardon for Estate or Life the Act voiding any Pardon granted to any attainted by it after Nov. 1. 1689. or not enrolled before the last day of that Month. 18. And now I doubt not but the Reader from this Story which is literally true will observe first the Juggling of the Popish Lawyers with King James and will pity a Prince who gave himself up to such False and Double-dealing Counsellors when an Act of Parliament is made against a Papist then it is no less than Treason to question the King 's Pardoning and Dispensing Power but when an Act bears hard on a Protestant and the King has a mind to ease him then the King has no power to Dispense he cannot grant a Pardon tho he earnestly desire it From whence we may see that the Dispensing Power was only set up to shelter Papists from the Law and ruin Protestants and that Papists in their Hearts are as much against it as Protestants 2. We may observe what fair Justice was design'd for Protestants a Law was made to turn near 3000 out of their Estates and to take away their Lives if they did not come in against a certain day and yet the Law that subjected them to this Penalty was made a Secret and they not suffer'd to know one word of it till the time allow'd them to come in was past at least three Months but there was an Intrigue in this they knew they had a Party in England who were to face down the World that there were no such Acts made a Party that were to represent it as a Sham and Contrivance of King James's Enemies to make him Odious and the great Argument they were to urge to prove it must be to alledge Where is the Act Why doth it not appear If there were any such Act would not the People that came so often from Ireland and tell such Frightful Stories have brought it with them This is the part the Favourers of King James were to act in England and Scotland and this is the reason the Act was so long kept Secret 3. We may observe the Folly of those Men who were attainted in this Act themselves and yet Flatter themselves with the hopes of living Happily and enjoying their Estates nay and getting Preferment under K. James when restor'd to his Kingdoms these Men do not consider that this Act would be restor'd together with him and that then it is not in his power to do this for them that if they expect any such thing they must be oblig'd to an Irish Popish Parliament for it and he is much a Stranger to Ireland that knows not what Mercy an English-man and a Protestant is to exspect from them especially when they can give him nothing but what is taken from one of themselves Till therefore the Papists of Ireland become so good natur'd as to give away by their own voluntary act their Estates of which they were in actual Possession to Protestants it is the greatest Folly in the World for any Protestant to think of enjoying any Estate in Ireland 4. For 't is observable that the Protestants Estates were not only given away by this Act of Attainder but the Papists were likewise in Possession of them by the following means The Act of Repeal was to be executed by Commissioners appointed by the King who were to determine the Claims of the Proprietors or Heirs to the Proprietors of the respective Estates October 22. 1641. and give Injunctions to the Sheriff to put them in Possession In the mean time the Protestants were to keep their Possessions till the First of May 1690. and to pay Rent to the Popish Proprietors The same Commissioners were to set out Reprizals to reprizable Persons But notwithstanding this no such Commissioners ever sate the Protestants were generally outed and the Papists possess'd both of their old Estates and likewise of the Estates of Protestants they compass'd this by several Stratagems 19. Wherever the Protestants had set their Lands to Papist Tenants those Tenants forsook their Protestant Landlords and became Tenants to the pretended Popish Proprietors Several Protestants complained in Chancery of this as contrary to the Act which allowed them to keep Possession till May 1690. which not being yet come nor any Commissioners being yet appointed to execute the Act they mov'd for an Injunction to quite their Possessions but the Chancellor answer'd That this did not concern Landlords that set their Lands but only such as occupied Farms themselves and that the Parliament had granted that indulgence to them only that they might have time to dispose of their Stocks which not being their Case who had Tenants they must go to Common Law and try their Titles by this means most of the old Popish Proprietors got into their Estates Nay they not only outed the Landlords of their Estates but even the Protestant Tenants of their Leases made in consideration of a valuable reserv'd Rent though this was positively against the intent of the Act which confirm'd such Leases and only gave the reserved Rent to the restor'd Proprietor 2.
but by the legal course of Juries But King James and his Parliament intended to do the work of Protestants speedily and effectually and not to wait the slow methods of proceeding at the Common Law They resolv'd therefore on a Bill of Attainder and in order to it every Member of the House of Commons return'd the Names of such Protestant Gentlemen as liv'd near him or in the County or Burrough for which he serv'd and if he was a stranger to it he sent into the County or Place for information they were in great haste and many escaped them on the other hand some that were actually in King James's Service and fighting for him at Derry of which Cornet Edmund Keating Nephew to my Lord Chief Justice Keating was one were return'd as absent and attainted in the Act. When they had made a Collection of Names they cast them into several Forms and attainted them under several Qualifications and accordingly allow'd them time to come in and put themselves on Tryal the Qualifications and Numbers were as follow 1. Persons Attainted of Rebellion who had time given them till till the Tenth of August to surrender themselves and be tryed provided they were in the Kingdom and amenable to the Law at the time of making the Act otherwise were absolutely Attainted One Archbishop One Duke Fourteen Earls Seventeen Viscounts and one Viscountess Two Bishops Twelve Barons Twenty six Baronets Twenty two Knights Fifty six Clergymen Eleven hundred fifty three Esquires Gentlemen c. 2. Persons who were absentees before the Fifth of Novem. 1688 not returning according to the Proclamation of the Twenty fifth of March attainted if they do not appear by the First of September 1689. One Lord. Seven Knights Eight Clergymen Sixty five Esquires Gentlemen c. 3. Persons who were Absentees before the Fifth of November 1688. not returning according to the Proclamation of the Twenty fifth of March attainted if they do not appear by the First day of October 1689. One Archbishop One Earl One Viscount Five Bishops Seven Baronets Eight Knights Nineteen Clergymen Four hunder'd thirteen Esquires Gentlemen c. 4. Persons usually resident in England who are to signifie their Loyalty in case the King goes there the First of October 1689. and on His Majesties Certificate to the Chief Governour here they to be discharged otherwise to stand attainted One Earl Fifteen Viscounts and Lords Fourteen Knights Four hunder'd ninety two Esquires Gentlemen c. 5. Absentees by reason of sickness and noneage on proving their Loyalty before the last day of the first Term after their return to be acquitted and restor'd in the mean time their Estates Real and Personal are vested in His Majesty One Earl Seven Countesses One Viscountess Thirteen Ladies One Baronet Fifty nine Gentlemen and Gentlewomen 6. They vest all Lands c. belonging to Minors Ladies Gentlewomen in the King till they return and then upon Proof of their Loyalty and Faithfulness to King James they are allow'd to sue for their Estates before the Commissioners for executing the Acts of Repeal and Attainder if sitting or in the High Court of Chancery or Court of Exchequer and upon a Decree obtain'd for them there the Sheriffs are to put them in possession of so much as by the Decree of one of those Courts shall be adjudged them The Clauses in the Act are so many and so considerable that it never having been printed intire I thought it convenient to put it into the Appendix Perhaps it was never equall'd in any Nation since the time of the Proscription in Rome and not then neither for here is more than half as many Condemned in the small Kingdom of Ireland as was at that time proscribed in the greatest part of the then known World yet that was esteemed an unparallel'd Cruelty When Sir Richard Nagle Speaker of the House of Commons presented the Bill to King James for his Royal Assent he told him that many were attainted in that Act by the House of Commons upon such Evidence as fully satisfied the House the rest of them were attainted he said upon common Fame A Speech so very brutish that I can hardly perswade my self that I shall gain credit to the Relation but it is certainly true the Houses of Lords and Commons of their pretended Parliament are Witnesses of it and let the World judge what security Protestants could have of their Lives when so considerable a Lawyer as Sir Richard Nagle declares in so solemn an occasion and King James with his Parliament approves that common Fame is a sufficient Evidence to deprive without hearing so many of the Gentry Nobility and Clergy of their Lives and Fortunes without possibility of pardon and not not only cut off them but their Children and Posterity likewise By a particular Clause from advantages of which the former Laws of the Kingdom would not have deprived them though their Fathers had been found guilty of the worst of Treasons in particular Tryals 7. I shall only add a few Observations on this Act and leave the Reader to make others as he shall find occasion 1. Then this Act leaves no room for the King to pardon after the last day of November 1689. if the Pardon be not Enroll'd before that time the Act declares it absolutely void and null 2. The Act was conceal'd and no Protestant for any Money permitted to see it much less take a Copy of it till the time limited for Pardons was past at least Four Months So that the State of the Persons here attainted is desperate and irrecoverable except an Irish Popish Parliament will relieve them for King James took care to put it out of the power of any English Parliament as well as out of his own Power to help them by consenting to another Act of this pretended Parliament Intituled An Act declaring that the Parliaments of England cannot bind Ireland and against Writs of Errors and Repeals out of Ireland into England 3. It is observable with what hast and confusion this Act was drawn up and past perhaps no man ever heard of such a crude imperfect thing so ill digested and compos'd past on the World for a Law We find the same Person brought in under different Qualifications in one Place he is expresly allow'd till the First of October to come and submit to Tryalâ— and yet in another Place he is attainted if he do not come in by the First of September many are attainted by wrong Names many have their Christian Names left out and many whose Names and Sirnames are both put in are not distinguished by any Character whereby they may be known from others of the same Names 4. Many considerable Persons are left out which certainly had been put in if they could have gotten their Names which is a further proof of their hast and confusion in passing the Bill It is observable the Provost Fellowâ— and Scholars of the Colledge by Dublin are all omitted the Reason was
assistance rather more than on the Roman Catholicks now they knew very well that Murther is so hateful a thing that if they once fell a Massacring it would shock many of their Friends in England and Scotland from whom they expected great matters and therefore they thought it their interest to be as tender of Lives as they could and even the Priests when they encouraged them to Rob their Protestant Neighbours charg'd them not to kill them assuring them that every thing else would be forgiven them 3. The Protestants were extreamly cautious not to give the least offence they walked so warily and prudently that it was hardly possible to find any occasion against them and they were so true to one another and conversed so little with any of King James's Party that it was as difficult to fix any thing on them or to get any Information against them though several designs were laid against them and several false Witnesses produc'd as has been shewn yet their Stories still destroyed themselves by their Improbabilities inconsistency and the notorious infamy of the Witnesses 4. We had no experiment of what would have been done with the attainted Absentees for none of them run the hazard of a Tryal but we are sure no good could have been done them for they could neither have been pardoned for Estate nor Life and the best they could have expected was to have been sent to some other Kingdom as Sir Thomas Southwell was sent to Scotland for there could have been no living for them in Ireland 5. When any Protestant found himself obnoxious to the Government or but fancyed they had any thing to object against him he got out of the Kingdom or made his escape to the North as well as he could and in the mean time absconded many escaped hanging by these means which otherwise in all probability had been executed Lastly It was so much the Interest of King James in his Circumstances to have been kind to the Protestanâ—s of Ireland that we might rather have expected to have been courted than ill used by him the whole support and maintenance of his Army in Ireland depended on them they clothed fed armed and quartered them which they could not avoid doing with any safety to themselves or indeed possibility of living and the Officers of the Army were so sensible of this that when it was propos'd to turn all the Protestants out of the City of Dublin one of them answered that whenever they were turned out the Army must go with them for they could not be furnished with what they wanted by others And as it was King James's Interest to use them well upon the account of their being necessary to him in Ireland so his Affairs in England and Scotland did more particularly require it and he was forced to employ his Emissaries there to give it out that he did so Sir Daniel Mac Daniel who came out of the Isles of Scotland to Dublin in Winter 1689. and several Gentlemen of the Highlands with him declared that their Ministers in the Pulpit had assured them that the Protestants in Ireland lived under King James in the greatest freedom quiet and security both as to their Properties and Religion and that if their Countrymen knew the truth of the matter as they then found it here they would never fight one stroak for him and they seemed to stand amazed at what they saw and could hardly believe their own Eyes It is certain that King James had the like Instruments in England as I have noted before who forced down the World in Coffee-Houses and publick places that the Protestants in Ireland lived easie and happy under his Government however this shews how much it was really his Interest to have given his Protestant Subjects here no just cause of complaint and that it must proceed from a strange eagerness to destroy them that King James and his Party ventured in their Circumstances to go so far in it as they did their own imminent danger disswaded them from severity and their Interest manifestly obliged them to mildness and if notwithstanding these they condemned near Three thousand of the most Eminent Gentlemen Citizens Clergymen and Nobility of the Kingdom to death and loss of Estates we may easily guess what they would have done when their fear and interest were removed and they left to the swing of their own natural Inclinations and the tendency of their Principles Whosoever considers all Circumstances will conclude that no less was designed by them than the execution of the third Chapter of the Lateran Council the utter extirpation of the Hereticks of these Kingdoms SECT XIV Ninthly Shewing King James's Methods for destroying the Protestant Religion 1. THE design against the Lives and Fortunes of the Protestants is so apparent from the execution thereof especially by the Acts of the late pretended Parliament that they themselves can hardly deny it nay some were apt to glory in it and to let us know that it was not a late design taken up since the revolt of England as they call it from King James they thought fit to settle on the Duke of Tirconnel above 20 m. Pounds per Annum in value out of the Estates of some Protestant Gentlemen attainted by them as aforesaid in consideration of his signal Service of Twenty Years which he spent in contriving this Work and bringing it to pass as one of their most eminent Members exprest it in his Speech in Parliament and the particular Act which vests this Estate in him shews 2. But it may be thought that King James was more tender in the matter of Religion and that he who gloried so much in his resolution to settle Liberty of Conscience wherever he had Power as he told his pretended Parliament and set forth almost in every Proclamation would never have made any open Invasion on the Consciences of his Protestant Subjects But they found by experience that a Papist whatever he professes is but an ill Guardian of Liberty of Conscience and that the same Religion that obliged the King of Spain to set up an Inquisition could not long endure the King of England to maintain Liberty If indeed King James had prevailed with Italy or Spain to have tolerated the open exercise of the Protestant Religion it had been I believe a convincing Argument to England to have granted Roman Catholicks Liberty in these Dominions but whilst the Inquisition is kept up to the height in those Countries and worse than an Inquisition in France against the publick Edicts and Laws of the Kingdom and against the solemn Oath and Faith of the King it is too gross to go about to perswade us that we might expect a free exercise of our Religion any other way than the Protestants enjoy it in France that is under the Discipline of Dragoons after the Papists had gotten the Arms the Offices the Estates and Courts of Judicature into their Hands 3. The Protestant Religion and
Clergy were established in Ireland by as firm Laws as the Properties of the Laity The King by his Coronation Oath was obliged to maintain them Their Tithes and Benefices were their Free-holds and their Priviledges and Jurisdiction were settled and confirmed to them by the known and current Laws of the Kingdom according to which the King was obliged to govern them and whereof he was the Guardian The Clergy had beside all this peculiar Obligations on him and a Title to his Protection for they had espous'd his Interest most cordially Whilst Duke of York they used their utmost diligence to perswade the People to submit to Gods Providence and be content with his Succession to the Crown in case his Brother dyed before him and they prest that point so far that many of their People were dissatisfied with them and told them often with heat and concern what reward they must expect for their pains if ever he came to the Throne they saw their danger but could not imagine any man would be so unpolitick and ungrateful as to destroy such as had brought him to the Throne and could only keep him safe in it and therefore they ventured all to serve him and many of them by their Zeal for him lost the Affections of their People and their Interest with them It was chiefly due to their diligence and care that his Title from the beginning met not the least opposition in Ireland tho the Army in it were intirely Protestant Had they and the rest of the Protestants in this Kingdom been in any measure disloyally principled in the time of Monmouth and Argile's Rebellion they might easily have made an Insurrection more dangerous than both those and the least Mutiny or revolt amongst them could hardly have failed to have ruined King James's Affairs at that critical time but they were so far from attempting any such thing that they were as ready and as zealous to assist him as his very Guards at Whitehall which he himself could not but acknowledge how he rewarded them I have already shewn and how grateful he was to the Clergy that thus principled them will appear by the Sequel 4. First therefore when his Majesty came to the Crown he declared that he would protect the Church of England in her Government and Priviledges under which we suppos'd the Church of Ireland to be concluded And accordingly the Clergy and People of this Kingdom return'd his Majesty their Address of Thanks though they very well knew that this was no more than was due to them by the Laws and by the King's Coronation Oath in particular But they were soon told by the Roman Catholicks that his Majesty did not intend to include Ireland in that Declaration and that it must be a Catholick Kingdom as they term'd it Every discerning Protestant soon found by the method they saw his Majesty take that he in earnest intended to settle Popery in England as well as Ireland but he thought himself so sure of effecting it suddenly in Ireland that his Instruments made no scruple to declare their intentions nay they were so hasty to ruin our Religion that they did not so much as consult their own Safety but even before it was either seasonable or safe in the opinion of the wiser sort amongst themselves they began openly to apply all their Arts and Engines to effect it 1. By hindring the Succession and Supplies of Clergy-men 2. By taking away their maintenance 3. By weakning and then invading their Jurisdiction 4. By seizing on their Churches and hindring their Religious Assemblies 5. By violence against their Persons And 6. By slandering and misrepresenting them and their Principles SECT XV. 1. King James in order to destroy the Protestant Religion hindred the Education and Succession of Clergy-men 1. THE Good and Support of Religion doth very much depend on the educating and principling Youth in Schools and Universities and the Law had taken special care that these should be in the hands of English men and Protestants and the better to secure them the Nomination of the Schoolmasters in every Diocess except four is by a particular Act of Parliament lodged in the Lord Lieutenant or Chief Governour for the time being The Clergy of each Diocess by the Act are obliged to maintain a Schoolmaster and his Qualifications are described in the Act. But when the Earl of Tyrconnel came to the Government he took no notice of those Laws but when any School became void he either left it unsupplyed or put a Papist into it And in the mean time great care was taken to discourage such Protestant Schoolmasters as remain'd and to set up Popish Schools in opposition to them Thus they dealt with the School of Killkenny founded and endowed by the charitable Piety of the late Duke of Ormond they set up a Jesuits School in the Town and procured them a Charter for a Colledge there they drove away the Protestant Schoolmaster Doctor Hinton who had officiated in it with great industry and success and seiz'd on the School-house commonly call'd the Colledge and converted it to an Hospital for their Soldiers Thus in a few years they would not have left one publick School in the hands of a Protestant for the Education of their Youth 2. There is but one University in Ireland and there is a Clause in the Statutes thereof that gives the King Power to dispense with the said Statutes it was founded by Queen Elizabeth and certainly never designed by her or her Successors to be converted against the fundamental Design of its Institution into a Seminary of Popery yet advantage was taken of this Clause though we had reason to believe it would have been done if there had been no such Clause to put in Popish Fellows as soon as the Fellowships became vacant one Doyle a Convert was the first who was named a Person of so exceedingly lewd and vicious a Conversation as was fully prov'd before the Lord Tyrconnell and of so little Sence or Learning that it seemed impossible that any Government should have countenanc'd such a Man yet this did not much weigh with his Excellency and therefore the Colledge insisted upon another Point the Dispensation that Doyle had gotten through his ignorance was not for his purpose for it required in express Terms that he should take the Oath of a Fellow and that Oath includes in it the Oath of Supremacy the Provost tendered it to him but he durst not take it for fear of disobliging his own Party upon this they refused to admit him he insists on his Claim and complains to the Lord Deputy upon a hearing Justice Nugent Baron Rice and the Attorny General supplyed the Place of Advocates for him but the Case was so plain that even Justice Nugent had not the confidence to deny the insufficiency of his Dispensation and therefore they ordered him to get another But to be even with the Colledge for demurring on the King's Mandate they stopt
the Money due to it out of the Exchequer 3. The Foundation consists of a Provost Seven Senior and Nine Junior Fellows and Seventy two Scholars these are partly maintain'd by a Pension out of the Exchequer of 388. l. per Annum this Pension the Earl of Tyrconnel stopt from Easter 1688. and could not be prevail'd with by any intercession or intreaties to grant his Warrant after that time for it by which means he in effect dissolv'd the Foundation and stopt the Fountains of Learning and of Religion this appeared to have been his design more plainly afterwards for King James and his Party not content to take their maintenance from them proceeded and turn'd out the Vice Provost Fellows and Scholars seiz'd upon the Furniture Books and publick Library together with the Chappel Communion Plate and all things belonging to the Colledge or to the private Fellows or Scholars notwithstanding that when they waited on him upon his first arrival in Dublin he promis'd That he would preserve them in their Liberties and Properties and rather augment than diminish the Priviledges and Immunities granted to them by his Predecessors In the House they placed a Popish Garrison turn'd the Chappel into a Magazin and many of the Chambers into Prisons for Protestants the Garrison destroy'd the Doors Wainscots Closets and Floors and damnified it in the Building and Furniture of private Rooms to at least the value of 2000. l. One Doctor Moore a Popish Priest was nominated Provost one Macarty Library Keeper and the whole designed for them and others of their Fraternity 4. It is observable that there was not the least Colour or Pretence of Law for this violence nor could they give the least Reason in Law or Equity for their proceeding except the necessity of destroying of the Protestant Seminaries of Learning in order to destroy their Religion This made them so eager against the Collegians that they were not content to turn them without Process or Colour of Law out of their Free-holds but they sent a Guard after them to sieze and apprehend their Persons and it cost the Bishop of Meath their Vice-Chancellor all his Cunning and Interest with the Governour Lutterell to prevent their Imprisonment With much ado he was prevailed on to let them enjoy their Liberties but with this Condition that on pain of Death no Three of them should meet together So sollicitous were they to prevent the Education of Protestants under Persons of the same Profession and that there might be none to succeed the present Clergy 5. With the same design they hindred the succession of Bishops and inferiour Clergy-men into the room of those that dyed or were removed the Support of Religion as is well known depends very much on the choice and settling of able and fit Persons in Vacancies and it so happened that partly by the uncertainty of Estates partly by frequent Forfeitures to the King partly by the grasping of the Prerogative and other Accidents most of the considerable Preferments and Benefices of the Church were in the disposal of the Crown there are very few Livings in Ireland in the Presentation of Lay Patrons but they either belong to the King or the Bishops The Bishopricks are all in the King and all the Livings in the Bishops Patronage are in the Vacancy of the Bishoprick likewise the Kings This is a great Trust and the King is bound to dispose of it for the good of the Church But King James plainly design'd by the means of his Trust to destroy the Church that had intrusted him for instead of giving the Preferments as they fell to good and able men who might preserve and maintain the Interest of their Religion he seiz'd them into his own hand had the Profits of them returned into the Exchequer and let the Cures lye neglected The Archbishoprick of Cashell the Bishopricks of Clogher of Elphin and of Clonfert were thus seiz'd with many Inferiour Livings and the Money received out of them dispos'd to the maintenance of Popish Bishops and Priests directly against the Laws and Constitution of the Kingdom 6. At this rate in a few years all the Preferments and Livings of the Kingdom of any value must have fallen into the King's hands and we must have expected to have seen them thus dispos'd of for as many as fell after King James's time were put to this use and we were assured by the Popish Priests that all the rest as they became vacant were design'd to the same Purpose and they were so unreasonable that though both Law and Justice allow a competency for serving the Cure whilst a Living upon any Account whatsoever is in the King's Hand yet the Commissioners of the Revenue and Barons of the Exchequer would allow nothing the Bishop of Meath made an Experiment of this Some Livings in his Diocess upon the Death of one Mr. Duddle the Incumbent were seiz'd by the Commissioners of the Revenue being in the King's Presentation the Bishop did what was in his Power towards supplying the Cure and according to his Duty appointed a Curate assigning him a Salary according to the Canons but the Commissioners would not allow him any thing and though the Bishop endeavoured it and petition'd both the Commissioners and Barons of the Exchequer yet he could never get any thing for the Curate This was a Precedent and the same was practis'd in all other Cases all the Absentees Cures were in the same Condition and though they yielded plentifully to King James yet the Curates had no other maintenance than the voluntary Contributions of the poor plunder'd Protestant Parishioners who were forced to pay their Tythes either to King James's Commissioners or to Popish Priests who had Grants of them 7. This was an effectual though a slow way of putting an end to the Ministry at least to deprive them of all legal Title to Preferments for the Bishops being most of them old would soon have dropt off and King James was resolved to have named no more and so the legal Successions of Bishops must in a short time have ceas'd and all the Livings depending on them must likewise have gone in course to maintain Popish Priests that is all the Deanries Dignitaries and most other Benefices 8. The Papists upbraided us with out want of Power and seem'd to laugh at the Snare into which we were fallen by means of our Popish King not considering that this proceeded from a manifest Breach of Trust and Faith in him and that the Case is the same in all Trusts if the Trustees prove faithless and even in all Popish Countries the Kings have the nomination of Bishops as well as in England and that the Succession of Bishops had almost lately failed in Portugal upon some difference between the King and Pope and the Advocate General of France Mr. Dennis Tallon tells us in 1688. that Thirty five Bishopricks being about a third part of the whole Number were vacant in that Kingdom on the same account
and 't is like more are vacant since It is true the Church has power to nominate Bishops without the consent of the Civil Magistrate but then they must not expect the Temporalities which are the Gifts or Grants of Kings and such Bishops and Clergy must intirely depend on the voluntary Contributions of their People for their maintenance and on their voluntary submission for their Juisdiction And here the Protestant Clergy had the greatest reason in the world to complain of King James to set him on the Throne the Clergy disobliged many of their People and he in requital deprived them of all other Worldly Support or Power besides what must depend on the free choice of those very People whom for his sake they had not only disobliged but likewise help'd to bring under many Inconveniencies SECT XVI 2. King James took away the maintenance of the present Protestant Clergy 1. BUT King James did not only endeavour to hinder the Education and Succession of the Protestant Clergy but he likewise took away all their present maintenance Immediately upon his coming to the Crown their Popish Parishioners began to deny the payment of Book-moneies which is a considerable part of the Ecclesiastical Revenue of Ireland a great part of the Tithes of Ireland are impropriate in some Places the whole Tythes in many Two third Parts and in most the one half and there is little left for the Vicar that serves the Cure except it be the Third part of the Tythes or the small Fees due out of Burials Marriages or Easter Offerings these Dues are call'd commonly Book-moneys and though very inconsiderable in themselves yet make a great part and in some Places the whole of what falls to the Vicar's portion against these the Popish Judges declar'd in their Circuits and by their encouragement most People and the Papists universally deny'd to pay them 2. The Priests began to declare that the Tythes belong'd to them and forbad their People to pay them to the Protestant Clergy with this the People complied willingly and for Two years before the late Revolution in England hardly any Tythes were recovered by the Clergy or if any were recovered it was with so much difficulty and cost that they turn'd to very little account 3. They past an Act in their pretended Parliament whereby they took away all Tythes that were payable by Papists and gave them to their own Popish Priests and allow'd them to bring an Action for them at the Common Law to make the recovery of them more easie and yet denyed this to the Protestant Clergy alleadging that they allow'd them still their old means of recovering their Tythes and therefore did them no injury But this was as good as nothing for they had so weaken'd the Ecclesiastical Power and Jurisdiction that it was incapable of compelling the People to obedience and it being necessary to sue out a Writ de excommunicato capiendo in order to force such as were refractory the Popish Chancellor either directly refused to grant the Writ or else laid so many impediments and delays in the way that it cost double the Value of the Tythes sued for to take it out 4. Though they rendered the Protestant Clergy uncapable of enjoying the Tythes of Roman Catholicks yet the Popish Clergy were made capable of enjoying the Protestant Tythes The Case then was thus if a Protestant had a Bishoprick Dignity or other Living by the new Act he must not demand any Tythes or Ecclesiastical Dues from any Roman Catholick and as soon as his Preferment became void by his death cession or absence a Popish Bishop c. was put into the Place and by their Act there needed no more to oblige all Men To repute take and deem a Man to be a Roman Catholick Bishop or Dean of any Place than the King 's signifying him to be so under his Privy Signet and Sign Manual a Power that the Protestants how much soever they magnified the King's Authority never trusted any King with nor other Mortal man whatsoever But as soon as any one became thus Entitled to a Bishoprick c. immediately all the Tythes as well of Protestants as of Papists became due to him with all the Glebes and Ecclesiastical Dues and for the recovery of them he had an Action at Common Law 5. Notwithstanding the Glebes and Protestants Tythes were not given to the Popish Clergy during the incumbency of the present Protestant Incumbents yet the Popish Priests by violence entred on the Glebes where there were any pretending that the King had nothing to do with them and that neither he or his Parliament could hinder the Church of her Rights and this Pretence was so far countenanced that no endeavours whatsoever could get any of these Priests out when once he had gotten possession The Truth is hardly one Parish in ten in the Provinces of Leinster Munster or Connaught have any Glebe left them for either they were never endowed or if they had been at any time endowed with Glebes the many Confusions and new Dispositions of Lands have made them to be forgotten or swallowed up in the Hands of some powerful Parishoners The pretence therefore of the Parliament that they had been kind to the Protestant Clergy in leaving them the Glebes was a meer piece of Hypocrisie since they knew that generally Parishes had no Glebes and that where they had Glebes the Priests would make a shift to get into possession of them without being given to them by the Parliament 6. The same may be said of their leaving some of the Tythes belonging to Protestants for the present to their own Clergy They had so robb'd and plundered the Protestants of the Country that few liv'd or had any thing Tithable in it being forced for their own safety to flee to the Towns and leave their Farms wast if any had Tythes they might pay them if they pleas'd or let it alone for they had left the Protestant Clergy as I shew'd before no way of recovering their Dues Many times the Priests came with a Company of the next quarter'd Dragoons and took the Tythes away by force and this past for a Possession of the Livings and the Protestant Ministers must bring their Leases of Ejectment if they would recover their Possessions or pretend any more to Tythes in those Livings There is a Custom in Ireland whereby some Farmers do agree with their Neighbours to plow their Lands for them on Condition that they afford them a certain quantity of Corn suppose an Half one Third or one Fourth after it is reaped Now Protestants that had Farms in the Country being in no capacity to plow them after their Horses were taken away and their Houses robb'd agreed with their Popish Neighbours to plow their Lands for them according to the Custom of the Country this was enough to Entitle Priests to the Tythes of Lands so plowed and accordingly they seiz'd upon them by force though both the Land
and Corn belong'd to Protestants by these and other such Contrivances from the year 1686. till King James's Power was put to an end by the Victory at the Boyn hardly any Protestant enjoy'd any Tythes in the Country all which was represented to the Government but to no purpose 7. In Corporate Towns and Cities there was a peculiar Provision made for Ministers by Act of Parliament in King Charles the Second's time by which Act the Houses in those Places were to be valued by Commissioners at a moderate value and the Lord Lieutenant or chief Governour for the time being did assign a certain Proportion for the Ministers maintenance not greater than the Twentieth part of the yearly value return'd by the Commissioners That therefore the City Protestant Clergy might not be in a better condition than those in the Country an Act was past in their pretended Parliament to take away this altogether the Clergy of Dublin desir'd to be heard concerning this Act at the Bar of the House of Lords before it past and their Council were admitted to speak to it who shew'd the unreasonableness and unjustice of it so evidently and insisted so boldly on King James's Promise to the Protestant Clergy at his first arrival in this Kingdom when he gave them the greatest assurances of maintaining them in their Rights and Priviledges and further bid them if aggriev'd in any thing to make their Complaints immediately to him and engaged to see them redrest that he seemed to be satisfied and the House of Lords with him yet the design to ruin them was so fixt that without offering any thing by way of Answer to the Reasons urged against it the Act past and thereby left the Clergy of the Cities and Corporate Towns without any pretence to a maintenance except they could get it from the voluntary Contributions of their People nay so malicious were they against the Protestant Clergy that they cut off the Arrears due to them as well as the growing Rent having left no means to recover them as appear'd upon Tryal at the Council-board afterward when some of the Clergy petitioned for relief therein 8. Upon the Plantation of Ulster 1625. there was a Table of Tythes agreed on by the King and Council and the Planters to whom the Grants were made by the King obliged to pay Tythes according to that Table the pretended Parliament took away this Table also for no other Reason that we could learn but because most of the Inhabitants of Ulster were Protestants and consequently the Protestant Clergy would pretend to them 9. The Livings of Ireland were valued by Commissions in Henry the Eight and Queen Elizabeths time and paid First Fruits and Twentieth Parts according to that valuation other Livings were held in Farm from the Crown and paid yearly a considerable reserved Rent commonly call'd Crown Rents others appertain'd to the Lord Lieutenant and other Officers of State and paid a certain rate of Corn for their use commonly call'd Port Corn. Now all these Payments were exacted from the Protestant Clergy notwithstanding the greatest part of their Tythes were taken from them The remaining part where any remained was seiz'd in many Places by the Commissioners of the Revenue and a Custodiam granted of it for the King's use for the payment of the Duties which accru'd out of the whole and not one Farthing allow'd for the Incumbent or the Curate nay in some Places they seiz'd the Incumbents Person and laid him in Jail till he paid these Duties though at the same time they had seiz'd his Livings and found that they were not sufficient to answer what they exacted and because the Clerk of the First Fruits Leiutenant Colonel Roger Moore being a Protestant himself would not be severe with the Clergy and seize their Livings and Persons to force them to pay what he knew they were not in a capacity to do they found pretence to seize his Person and sent him with Three Files of Musquetiers Prisoner to the Castle of Dublin where he and two Gentlemen more lay in a cold nasty Garret for some Months By these Contrivances the few Benefices yet in the hands of the Protestants instead of a support became a burthen to them and they were forced to cast themselves for a maintenance on the kindness of their People who were themselves undone and beggar'd SECT XVII 3. King James took away the Jurisdiction of the Church from Protestants 1. IT is impossible any society should subsist without a power of rewarding and punishing its Members now Christ left no other power to his Church but what is purely Spiritual nor can the Governours of the Church any other way punish their Refractory Subjects but by refusing them the Benefits of their society the Administration of the Word and Sacraments and the other Spiritual Offices annexed by Christ to the Ministerial Function But Kings and Estates have become Nursing Fathers to the Church and lent their Temporal power to second her Spiritual Censures The Jurisdiction therefore of the Clergy so far as it has any Temporal effect on the Bodies or Estates of Men is intirely derived from the Favour of States and Princes and acknowledged to be so in the Oath of Supremacy However this is now become a right of the Clergy by ancient Laws through all Christendom and to take it away after so long continuance must needs be a great blow to Religion and of worse Consequence than if the Church had never possessed it yet this was actually done by King James to the Protestant Clergy and is a plain sign that he intended to destroy their Religion when he depriv'd them of their support 2. For first he past an Act of Parliament whereby he exempted all that dissented from our Chruch from the Jurisdiction thereof and a Man needed no more to free him from all punishment for his Misdemeanors though only cognizable and punishable in the Ecclesiastical Courts than to profess himself a Dissenter or that it was against his Conscience to submit to the Jurisdiction of our Church nay at the first the Act was so drawn and past the House of Commons that no Protestant Bishop could pretend to any Jurisdiction even over his own Clergy but that and several other passages in the Commons Bills were so little pleasing to some who understood the King's Interest that Sir Edward Herbert was employed by King James to amend the Act for the House of Lords which he did in the form it is now in nothing of the Commons Bill being left in it but the word Whereas tho after all it effectually destroyed the Jurisdiction of the Church 3. But second in most places there was no Protestant Bishop left and consequently the Popish Bishop was to succeed to the Jurisdiction they being by another Act invested in Bishopricks as soon as they could procure King Jame's Certificate under his privy Signet that they were Archbishops or Bishops all incapacities by reason of their religion by any Statute
or Law whatsoever being taken off There were already vacant in Ireland one Archbishoprick and three Bishopricks they had Attainted Two of the surviving Archbishops and Seven Bishops so that they had already the Jurisdiction of ¾ of the Kingdom by a Law of their own making secured into the Hands of Papists and the rest were quickly to follow 4. But Third where any shadow of Jurisdiction remain'd with the Protestant Clergy they rendered it insignificant by encouraging the most Obstinate and Perverse Sectaries and by shewing them Favour according as they were most opposite and refractory to all Ecclesiastical Discipline and paying their Dues to the Clergy this may be suppos'd one reason of their peculiar Fondness of Quakers and that it was upon this account chiefly they made them Burgesses or Aldermen in their new Corporations and reckoned them as most useful Tools to pull down the Discipline of the Church tho their Tythes were not given away to the Popish Priests yet there was no way left for the Protestant Clergy to recover them they being exempted from their Jurisdiction and from the very beginning of King James's Reign they so ordered the matter that Quakers were generally exempted from paying Tythes which at last became a more sensible loss to the Protestant Clergy because these were the only People that call'd themselves Protestants who had any thing left them out of which Tythes were due 5. 'T was on the same account that lewd and debauch't Converts were encouraged amongst them and a Man needed no more to escape the Censures and punishments due to his Crimes but to profess himself reconcil'd upon which all proceedings against him must immediately cease Thus many lewd Women turn'd Converts and continued their Wickedness without fear of the Ecclesiastical Judg. 6. If at any time a Bishop went about to correct a Scandalous Clergy-man the Kings Courts immediately interpos'd and granted prohibitions tho the matter did not bear one They knew it must put the Bishop to much pains and costs to have it removed and they were in hopes to weary him out before he could get a Consultation and so zealous were the Popish Lawyers to protect a Scandalous Minister against his Bishop that they would of their own accord gratis plead his Cause they thought it Fee enough to weaken the Jurisdiction of a Protestant Bishop and to do a mischief to our Religion by keeping in a wicked scandalous Clergy-man to be a reproach to it One Mr. Ross was prosecuted by his Bishop for very leud and notorious Crimes but the King's Judges interpos'd and Serjeant Dillon then Prime Serjeant pleaded his Cause gratis against the Bishop of Kilmore who prosecuted him If any Clergy-man turn'd Papist as we have reason to thank God that very few did whatever his Motives of Conversion were he was sure to keep his Livings by a Dispensation and to be exempted from the Power of his Bishop 7. King James by an order under his Privy Signet took on him to appoint Chancellors to exercise jurisdiction over Protestants Thus he appointed one Gordon who called himself Bishop of Galloway in Scotland to be Chancellor in the Diocess of Dublin this Gordon was a very ignorant lewd Man and a profest Papist yet he took on him by Vertue of King James's Mandate to exercise Ecelesiastical Jurisdiction over the Protestants of the Diocess to grant Licenses for Marriages Administrations of Wills and to Cite and Excommunicate whom he pleas'd But the Clergy refus'd to submit to him or to denounce his Excommunications which obliged him to let that part of his Jurisdiction fall but as to the other part that concern'd Wills he made his advantage of it he cited the Widow or Relation of any deceased Person and if they refused to appear he granted Administrations to some of his own Creatures and they came by force and took away the Goods of the Defunct It is incredible what wicked brutish things he with a parcel of ill Men he got to act with him did on this pretence and how he oppress'd and squeez'd the Widows and Orphans the poor People not being strong enough to oppose him and the Crew he employed for force was all the Right he could pretend it being notorious that in the vacancy of the Archbishoprick or in his absence when he cannot have intercourse with his Diocess the Jurisdiction devolveth to the Dean and Chapter as Guardians of the Spiritualities and they notwithstanding the difficulty of the times and danger they were in chose the Right Reverend the Bishop of Meath to administer the Jurisdiction which he did with all the meekness modesty and diligence that is peculiar to him though he could not hinder the forementioned Gordons Encroachments as to Administrations of Wills and Testaments In short King James by Vertue of his Supremacy claim'd a despotick Power over the Church and pretended that he might do what he pleas'd as to matter of Jurisdiction tho his Ecclesiastical Supremacy no more entitled him to encroach on the Liberties and Priviledges of the Church than his Civil entitled him to dispose of the Civil Rights of the Subjects of his Kingdoms He had indeed taken away the Oath of Supremacy by an Act of his pretended Parliament but yet he would not disown the Power vested in him by it tho the Papists would have had him renounce it expresly but he answered that he did not claim any Ecclesiastical Authority over his Roman Catholick Subjects nor pretended to be Supream in their Church in his Dominions but only over the Protestants the Mystery of which was plainly this he foresaw that the Ecclesiastical Authority which is settled by the Laws and trusted in the Crown as he could abuse it might be a means to destroy the Protestant Religion and to hinder the exercise of Ecclesiastical Discipline and therefore was resolved not to part with it not considering that such a manifest and designed abuse of a Trust in direct opposition to and destruction of the end for which it was granted to him was a provoking Temptation to his People on the first opportunity that offered to think of transferring it to some other Person that would administer it with more faithfulness according to the design for which it was granted 8. I might add as a Fifth means of destroying the Protestant Religion and slackening Discipline the universal Corruption of Manners that was encouraged at Court I do not charge King James with this in his own Person nor will I insinuate that he design'd it though he took no care to redress it but it lookt like a design in some and whether design'd or no it serv'd the Ends of Popery more than easily can be imagined and opened a wide Door for it That Kingdom that is very corrupt in Morals and debaucht is in a very fair way to embrace that Perswasion and generally their Proselites were such as had renounced Christianity in their Practice before they renounced the Principles thereof as taught in the
though the Protestants concerned sollicited it with the utmost eagerness and diligence even to the hazard of their Lives yet they could never procure the King and Councils Order for the restitution of their Church to be executed or obeyed and so they continued out of it till His present Majesties success restor'd them and their fellow Protestants to their Churches as well as to their other just Rights 12. Now here we had a full demonstration what the Liberty of Conscience would come to with which King James thought to have amused Protestants and of which he boasted so unmeasurably if once Popery had gotten the upper hand He and his Parliament might have made Acts for it if they pleas'd but we see here that the Clergy would have told them that they medled with what did not concern them and that they had no power to make Acts about Religious Matters or dispose of the Rights of Holy Church and we see from this Experiment who would have been obeyed We found here upon tryal that when King James would have kept his word to us it was not in his power to do it and that his frequently repeated Promises and his Act of Parliament for Liberty of Conscience could not prevent the demolishing defacing or seizing Nine Churches in Ten through the Kingdom and discovered to us That the Act for Liberty of Conscience was only design'd to destroy the Establish'd Church and not that Protestants should have the Benefit of it 13. Having taken away our Churches and publick Places of meeting the next thing was to hinder our Religious Assemblies It is observable that the Act of their pretended Parliament for Liberty of Conscience promises full and free exercise of their respective Religions to all that profess Christianity within the Kingdom without any molestation loss or penalty whatsoever but assigns no punishment to such as shall disturb any in their Religious Exercises and there was good reason for that omission for by this means they had left their Officers and Soldiers at liberty to disturb the Religious Assemblies of Protestants without fear of being call'd to any account 14. By the Act an open free and uninterrupted access was to be left into every Assembly and they commonly had their Emissaries in every Church to see if they could find any thing to object against the Preacher But the Ministers did not fear any thing could be objected even by malice on this Account and therefore when they found they were not like to make much of this they let it fall and the Officers and Soldiers came into the Churches in time of Divine Service or in time of Sermons and made a noise sometimes threatning the Ministers sometimes cursing sometimes swearing and sometimes affronting or assaulting Women and picking occasions of quarrels with the Men and comitting many disorders it vex'd and grieved them to see the Churches full contrary to their expectation that neither their Liberty of Conscience nor multiplying their Mass-houses nor their driving away several thousands of Protestants into England had in the least emptied them that their Liberty of Conscience instead of dividing had rather united Protestants and that the zeal and frequency of Devotion amongst those that remained supplyed the absence of those that were gone and crowded the Churches rather more than formerly it grieved them much to see those things and they on all occasions vented their spleen against the Assemblies of Protestants 15. In the Country where Churches were taken from the Protestants they met in private Houses and where their Ministers were gone and their maintenance seiz'd others undertook the Cures either gratis or were maintain'd by the voluntary Contributions of the People So that there appear'd no probability that Protestantism would be destroy'd without violence The Papists saw this and therefore watched an opportunity to begin it On the Sixth of Septem 1689. upon pretence of a Case of Pistols and a Sword found in some out part of Christ Church in Dublin they lockt it up for a Fortnight and suffered no Service to be in it On the Twenty seventh of October they took it to themselves and hindred Protestants to officiate any more in it On the Thirteenth of September on pretence of some Ships seen in the Bay of Dublin they forbad all Protestants to go to Church or assemble in any Place for Divine Service July 13. 1689. there issued out a Proclamation forbidding Protestants to go out of their Parishes one design of this was to hinder their Assemblies at Religious Duties for in Ireland generally Two or Three Parishes have but one Church and consequently by this one half were confined from the Service of God through the Kingdom June 1690. Colonel Lutterel Governour of Dublin issued his Order forbidding more than Five Protestants to meet together on pain of Death he was askt whether this was designed to hinder meeting at Churches it was answered that it was design'd to hinder their meeting there as well as in other places and in execution of this all the Churches were shut up and all Religious Assemblies through the Kingdom forbidden under pain of Death and we were assured that if King James had return'd Victorious from the Boyn it was resolved that they should never have been opened any more for us and the same excuse would have served for his permitting this that serv'd him the former year for not restoring the Churches taken away in his absence at the former Camp even that he must not disoblige his Roman Catholick Clergy Thus God gave them opportunity to shew what they intended against our Religion even to take away all our Churches and hinder all our Religious Assemblies and when they had brought their Liberty of Conscience to this and we had been obliged upon pain of Death to forbear all publick Worship for a Fortnight then he sent us deliverancâ— by means of his present Majesties Victory at the Boyn which restor'd us the Liberty of worshiping God together as well as the use of our Churches SECT XIX 5. The violences used by King James's Party to make Converts and to discourage the Protestant Ministers 1. BUT all these methods of ruining the Protestant Religion seem'd tedious to the Priests and therefore they could not be prevail'd with to abstain from violence wherever they had a fair opportunity to use it they applyed it with all diligence Several Protestant Women were married to Papists many of these used unmerciful Severities to their Wives and endeavoured by hardships and unkindness to weary the poor Women out of their Religion some stript them of their Clothes kept them some days without Meat or Drink beat them grievously and at last when they could not prevail turn'd them out of their Houses and refus'd to let them live with them Some sold off all that they had turn'd it into Money and left their Wives and Children to beg for no other Reason but because they would not forsake their Religion And this carriage was
one thousand six hundred eighty nine be produced to your chief Governor or Governors of this Kingdom and enrolled in your Majesties High Court of Chancery the same shall be a sufficient Discharge and Acquittal to such of the Persons last before-named and every of them respectively whose Loyalty and Fidelity your Majesty will be pleased to certify in manner as afore-said And be it further enacted That in the mean time and until such Return and Acquittal all the Lands Tenements and Hereditaments within this Kingdom belonging to all and every Absentee and Absentees or other Person to be attainted as aforesaid shall be and are hereby vested in your Majesties your Heirs and Successors as from the first Day of August last past And be it further enacted by the Authority aforesaid that all and every such Person and Persons as by any the foregoing Clauses is are or shall be respectively attainted shall as from the first Day of August one thousand six hundred eighty eight forfeit unto your Majesty your Heirs and Successors all such Mannors Lands Tenements and Hereditaments and all Right Title-Service Chiefery Use Trust Condition Fee Rent-Charge Right of Redemption of Mortgages Right of Entries Right of Action or any other Interest of what nature or kind soever either in Law or Equity of in or unto any Lands Tenements or Hereditaments within this Kingdom belonging or appertaining to such Person or Persons so as aforesaid attainted or to be attainted in his or their own Right or to any other in Trust for him or them on the said first Day of August one thousand six hundred eighty eight or at any time since and all the said Lands Tenements and Hereditaments so as aforesaid forfeited unto and vested in your Majesty your Heirs and Successors hereby are and shall be vested in your Majesty your Heirs and Successors whether such Person or Persons were seized thereof in Fee absolute or conditional or in Tayl or for Life or Lives and that freed and freely discharged off and from all Estates Tayl and for Life and from all Reversions and Remainders for Life for Years or in Fee absolute or conditional or in Tayl or to any Person or Persons whatsoever such Remainder as by one Act or Statute of this present Parliament intituled An Act for repealing the Acts of Settlement an Explanation Resolution of Doubts and all Grants Patents and Certificates pursuant to them or any of them or by this present Act are saved and preserved always excepted and fore-prized Provided always that the Nocency or Forfeiture of any Tenant in Dower Tenant by the Courtesy Jointress for Life or other Tenant for Life or Lives in actual Possession shall not extend to bar forfeit make void or discharge any Reversion or Reversions vested in any Person or Persons not ingaged in the Usurpation or Rebellion aforesaid such Reversion and Reversions being immediately depending or expectant upon the particular Estate of such Tenant in Dower Tenant by the Courtesy Joyntress for Life or other Tenant for Life or Lives any thing in the said Act of Repeal or in this present Act to the contrary notwithstanding Provided always and be it further enacted by the Authority aforesaid that nothing in this present Act contained shall any way extend or be construed to extend to forfeit or vest in your Majesties your Heirs or Successors any Remainder or Remainders for valuable Considerations limited or settled by any Settlement or Conveyance made for such valuable Considerations either of Marriage or Marriage-Portion or other valuable Consideration whatsoever upon any Estate for Life or Lives to any Person or Persons not concerned in the Usurpation or Rebellion aforesaid such Remainder or Remainders as are limited or settled by any Conveyance wherein there is any Power for revoking and altering all or any the Use or Uses therein limited and also such Remainder and Remainders as are limited upon any Settlement or Conveyance of any Lands Tenements and Hereditaments commonly called Plantation-Lands and all Lands Tenements and Hereditaments held or enjoyed under such Grants from the Crown or Grants upon the Commission or Commissions of Grace for Remedy of defective Titles either in the Reign of King James the first or King Charles the first in which several Grants respectively there are Provisoes or Covenants for raising or keeping any number of Men or Arms for the King's Majesty against Rebels and Enemies or for raising of Men for his Majesties Service for Expedition of War always excepted and foreprized All which Remainders limited by such Conveyances wherein there is a Power of Revocation for so much of the Lands Uses and Estates therein limited as the said Power doth or shall extend unto and all such Remainders as are derived or limited for or under such Interest made of Plantation-Lands or other Lands held as aforesaid under such Grants from the Crown and all and every other Remainder and Remainders Reversion and Reversions not herein mentioned to be saved and preserved shall by the Authority of this present Parliament be deemed construed and adjudged void debarred and discharged to all Intents and Purposes whatsoever against your Majesty your Heirs and Successors and your and their Grantees or Assignees and the said Lands Tenements and Hereditamens belonging to such Rebels as aforesaid shall be vested in your Majesty your Heirs and Successors freed and discharged of the said Remainder and Remainders and every of them And to the end the Reversions and Remainders saved and preserved by this Act may appear with all convenient Speed Be it further enacted by the Authority aforesaid That the respective Persons intituled to such Remainders and Reversions do within sixty Days next after the first sitting of the Commissioners for executing the said Act of Repeal and this present Act exhibit their Claims before the said Commissioners and make out their Titles to such Remainder or Remainders so as to procure their Adjudication and Certificate for the same or the Adjudication and Certificate of some three or more of them And further That all Remainders for which such Adjucations and Certificates shall not be procured at or before One hundred and twenty Days after the first sitting of the said Commissioners shall be void and for ever barred and excluded any thing in this Act or other Matter to the contrary in any wise notwithstanding All which Lands Tenements and Hereditaments mentioned as aforesaid to be forfeited unto and vested in your Majesty by any the Clauses aforesaid are hereby declared to be so forfeited unto and vested in your Majesty without any Office or Inquisition thereof found or to be found and the same to be to the Uses Intents and Purposes in the said Act of Repeal and in this present Act mentioned and expressed And whereas several Persons hereafter named viz. Lyonel Earl of Orrery Mrs. ..... Trapps Ann Vicecountess Dowager of Dungannon Robert Boyl Esq Catherine Woodcock Alice Countess Dowager of Drogheda Alice Countess Dowager of Mountroth Isabella Countess
first sitting of the said Commissioners and procure the Adjucation of them or any three or more of them thereupon within One hundred and twenty Days after the said first sitting of the said Commissioners And whereas by one or more Office or Offices in the Time of the Earl of Strafford's Government in this Kingdom in the Reign of King Charles the First of ever blessed Memory All or a great part of the Lands Tenements and Hereditaments in the Province of Conaught and Counties of Clare Limerick and Tipperary were vested in his Majesty And by the Acts of Settlement and Explanation the said Office and Offices are declared to be Null and Void since which time the said Acts have been by the said Act of Repeal repealed and thereby some Prejudice might arise or accrue to the Proprietors concerned in them Lands if not prevented Be it therefore Enacted by the Authority aforesaid That the said Office and Offices and every of them commonly called the Grand Office and the Title thereby found or endeavoured to be made out or set up from the time of the finding or taking thereof was and is hereby declared to be Null and Void to all Intents and Purposes whatsoever Provided that nothing therein contained shall any way extend or be construed to extend to charge any Person or Persons who hath bona Fide paid any Rents or Arrears of Rent that have been due and payable out of any Lands hereby vested in your Majesty or to charge any Steward or Receiver that received any such Rents or Arrears of Rents if he bona Fide paid the same but that he and they shall be hereby discharged for so much as he or they so bona Fide paid against your Majesty your Heirs and Successors Provided always and it is hereby Enacted That every Person not being a forfeiting Person within the true intent and meaning of the said former Act or of this present Act and who before the seventh Day of May One thousand six hundred eighty nine had any Statute Staple or Recognizance for paiment of Money or any Mortgage Rent-Charge Portion Trust or other Incumbrance either in Law or Equity or any Judgment before the Two and twentieth Day of May One thousand six hundred eighty nine for paiment of Money which might charge any of the Estates Lands Tenements or Hereditaments so as aforesaid forfeited unto and vested in your Majesty shall and may have the benefit of the said Statutes Staples Judgments Recognizances Mortgages Rent-Charge Portions Trust and other Incumbrances out of the Estate or Estates which should be liable thereunto in case the said former Act or this present Act had never been made Provided always that the Person and Persons who had such Statutes Staples Judgments Recognizances or other Trusts or Incumberances do claim the same before the Commissioners for the Execution of the said former Act within two months after the first sitting of the said Commissioners and procure their Adjucation thereof within such reasonable Time as the said Commissioners shall appoint for determining the same And to the end that such Person and Persons as shall have any of the said Lands Tenements or Hereditaments granted unto him as aforesaid may know the clear Value of the said Lands Tenements and Hereditaments so to be granted unto him above all Incumbrances and may injoy the same against all Statute-Staples Judgments Recognizances Mortgages Rent-Charges and other Incumbrances not claimed-and adjudged as aforesaid Be it therefore further enacted by the Authority aforesaid That all such Lands Tenements and Hereditaments as shall be forfeited unto and vested in your Majesty and granted by Letters Pattents pursuant to the said former Act or this present Act shall be and are hereby freed acquitted and discharged of and from all Estates Charges and Incumbrances whatsoever other than what shall be claimed and adjudged as aforesaid And whereas by one private Act of Parliament intituled An Act for securing of several Lands Tenements and Hereditaments to George Duke of Albemarle which Act was pass'd in the Reign of King Charles the Second some Lands Tenements and Hereditaments in this Kingdom which on the two and twentieth Day of October one thousand six hundred forty one belonged to some ancient Proprietor or Proprietors who were dispossessed thereof by the late usurped Powers were secured and assured unto the said George Duke of Albemarle by means whereof the ancient Proprietors of the said Lands may be barred and deprived of their ancient Estates unless the said Act be repealed though such ancient Proprietor or Proprietors be as justly intituled to Restitution as other ancient Proprietors who were dispossessed by the said Usurper and barred by the late Acts of Settlement and Explanation Be it therefore enacted That the said Act for securing of several Lands Tenements and Hereditaments to George Duke of Albemarle be and is hereby repealed to all Intents and Purposes whatsoever And that the Proprietors of the said Lands and their Heirs and Assignes be restored to their said ancient Estates in the same manner with the said other ancient Proprietors their Heirs and Assignes And whereas several ancient Proprietors whose Estates were seized and vested in Persons deriving a Title under the said Acts of Settlement or Explanation have in some time after the passing of the said Acts purchased their own ancient Estates or part thereof from the Persons who held the same under the said Acts as aforesaid which old Proprietors would now be restored to their said ancient Estates if they had not purchased the same And for as much as the said ancient Proprietors or their Heirs should receive no Benefit of the said Act of Repeal should they not be reprized for the Money paid by them for their said ancient Estates Be it therefore enacted by the Authority aforesaid That all and every the ancient Proprietor or Proprietors or their Heirs who have laid out any Sum or Sums of Money for the Purchase of their own ancient Estates or any part thereof as aforesaid shall receive out of the common Stock of Reprizals a sufficient Recompence and Satisfaction for the Money laid out or paid by him or them for the Purchase of their said ancient Estate at the Rate of ten Years Purchase any Clause Act or Statute to the contrary in any wise notwithstanding And for the Prevention of all unnecessary Delays and unjust Charges which can or may happen to the Subjects of this Realm before their full and final Settlement Be it further enacted by the Authority aforesaid That where the Commissioners for Execution of the said Act of Repeal or any three or more of them shall give any Certificate under his and their Hands and Seals to any Person or Persons Bodies Politick or Corporate in order to the passing of any Letters Patents according to the said Act and shall likewise return a Duplicate of such Certificate into his Majesties Court of Exchequer at Dublin to be there enrolled and the Person and Persons
same any thing in this or the said Act of Repeal to the contrary notwithstanding And it is further enacted by the Authority aforesaid That all Letters Patents hereafter to be granted of any Offices or Lands whatsoever shall contain in the same Letters Patents a Clause requiring and compelling the said Patentees to cause the said Letters Patents to be enrolled in the Chancery of Ireland within a time therein to be limited and all Letters Patents wherein such Clause shall be omitted are hereby declared to be utterly void and of none effect Provided always that if your sacred Majesty at any time before the first Day of November next by Letters Patents under the Broad Seal of England if reâ—â—ding there or by Letters Patents under the Great Seal of Ireland during your Majesties abode here shall grant your gracious Pardon or Pardons to any one or more of the Persons herein before mentioned or intended to be attainted who shall return to their Duty and Loyalty that then and in such case such Person and Persons so pardoned shall be and is hereby excepted out of this present Act as if they had never been therein named or thereby intended to be attainted and shall be and are hereby acquitted and discharged from all Attainders Penalties and Forfeitures created or inflicted by this Act or the said Act of Repeal excepting such Share or Proportion of their real or personal Estate as your Majesty shall think fit to except or reserve from them any thing in this present Act or in the said Act of Repeal contained to the contrary notwithstanding Provided always that every such Pardon and Pardons be pursuant to a Warrant under your Majesties Privy Signet and Sign manual and that no one Letters Patents of Pardon shall contain above one Person and that all and every such Letters Patents of Pardon and Pardons shall be enrolled in the Rolls Office of your Majesties High Court of Chancery in this Kingdom at or before the last Day of the said Month of November or in Default thereof to be absolutely void and of none Effect any thing herein contained to the contrary notwithstanding Provided likewise that if any Person or Persons so pardoned shall at any time after the Date of the said Pardon join with or aid or assist any of your Majesties Enemies or with any Rebels in any of your Majesties Dominions and be thereof convict or attainted by any due Course of Law that then and in such Case they shall forfeit all the Benefit and Advantage of such Pardon and shall be again subject and liable to all the Penalties and Forfeitures inflicted on them and every of them by this or the said Act of Repeal as if such Pardon or Pardons had never been granted Provided always that nothing in this Act contained shall extend or be construed to extend to or vest in your Majesty any Lands Tenements or Hereditaments or other Interest of any ancient Proprietor who by the said Act of Repeal is to be restored to his ancient Estate but that all such Person and Persons and all their Right Title and Interest are and shall be saved and preserved according to the true Intent and Meaning of the said Act any thing in these Presents to the contrary notwithstanding Copia vera Richard Darling Cleric in Offic. M ri Rot. The Perswasions and Suggestions the Irish Catholicks make to his Majesty Supposed to be drawn up by Talbot titular Arch-bishop of Dublin and found in Col. Talbot's House July 1. 1671. 1. THAT the Rebellion in Anno 1641. was the Act of a few and out of fear of what was doing in England That they were provoked and driven to it by the English to get their Forfeitures That they were often willing to submit to the King and did it effectually Anno 1648 and held up his Interest against the Usurper who had murdered his Father till 1653. After which time they served his Majesty in Foreign Parts till his Restauration 2. That they acquiesce in his Majesty's Declaration of Novemb. 30. 1660. And are willing that the Adventurers and Souldiers should have what is therein promised them but what they and others have more may be resumed and disposed of as by the Declaration 3. They desire for what Lands intended to be restored them shall be continued to the Adventurers and Souldiers that they may have a Compensation in Money out of his Majesty's new Revenues of Quit-Rents payable by the Adventurers and Souldiers The Hearth Money and Excise being such Branches as were not in 1641 and hope that the one will ballance the other 4. They say That his Majesty has now no more need of an Army than before 1641 That the remainder of his Revenue will maintain now as well as then what Forces are necessary 5. They desire to be restored to Habitations and Freedom within Corporations 1. That the General Trade may advance 2. That Garisons and Cittadels may become useless 3. That they may serve his Majesty in Parliament for bettering his Revenue and crushing and securing the Seditious in all Places 6. They desire to be Sheriffs and Justices of the Peace c. for the Ends and Purposes aforesaid and to have the Power of the Civil and Ordinary Militia 7. They also desire to be form'd into a Militia and to be admitted to be of the standing Army 8. That their Religion is consonant to Monarchy and implicit Obedience That they themselves have actually serv'd his Majesty in Difficulties That they have no other way to advantage themselves than by a strict adherence to the King That they have no other Refuge whereas many of his Majesty's Subjects do lean hard another way 9. That the Roman Catholicks are six to one of all others that of the said one to six some are Atheists and Neuters who will profess the Roman Catholick Religion others devoutly given will affect the same course that the rest may have their Liberty of Conscience and may be corrected in case they abuse it 10. That the Roman Catholicks having the full Power of the Nation they can at all times spare his Majesty an Army of Sixty thousand Men there being Twelve hundred thousand Souls in Ireland and so consequently an Hundred and fifty thousand between sixteen and sixty Years old Which Forces if allowed to Trade shall have Shipping to transport themselves when his Majesty pleaseth 11. That they have a good Correspondence abroad for that great numbers of their Nation are Souldiers Priests and Merchants in esteem with several great Princes and their Ministers 12. That the Toleration of the Roman Catholicks in England being granted and the Insolence of the Hollanders taken down a Confederacy with France which can influence England as Scotland can also will together by God's Blessing make his Majesty's Monarchy Absolute and Real 13. That if any of the Irish cannot have their Lands in specie but Money in lieu as aforesaid some of them may transport themselves into America possibly
Tyrrel's Papers March 8th 1689. I Have yours my D. L. of the 29th of January last your Style by Mr. Despont 'T is large and plain enough and another before more Concise and in Merchants Style both tending to the same end and of which I made use to the same purpose notwithstanding all the Discomposure of my Health this Month past as you shall I hope find by the Effects e'er this comes to your hands for the King upon your earnest Invitation in both your said Letters and by other strong Considerations took of a sudden the Resolution to go unto you and parted hence this day Sennight being the last of February and I hope in God is by this time landed somewhere in Ireland for the Wind serves fair ever since he parted and he did expect to be on Friday Night this being Monday following at Brest where all things and most part of the Officers were in a Readiness staying for his Majesty's Arrival for to part with the first Wind. I wrote unto you in that Conveniency by Sir Neal O Neal and another by Post at the same time This will go flower and by the second Voyage of the same Ships when they come back for more Men and Commodities It goes by a Friend I dare trust with all the Secrets of it and so I will be full plain and over-board The Bearer is Doctor Butler a good Gentlemans Son of a good Estate when People enjoyed their own Birth-right to which he is become himself Heir if he can recover it In which I shall beg your Favour and Protection for him when occasion doth require He has made all his Studies and took his Degrees here I have sufficiently instructed him of all the Contents of this Letter by word of Mouth for fear of any Miscarriage and although I ought to presume that all and every of you there and especially so clear sighted and foreseeing Persons as you and others like you need no Advertisement or Spurr Yet my Zeal pro Fide Rege Patria could not dispense with me to be silent from writing when I am not upon the Place to speak my Sense as others Now my Lord you have the King so much wished and longed for of whom we may say without Offence as of our Saviour hic positus est in Ruinam Resurrectionem multorum If you make good use of him you may get a Resurrection of many by him but if you make a bad use you may get their Ruine so all depends under God of the good or bad use you make of his Presence amongst you it is but a special Providence of God that he is so unexpectedly gone thither But when God's Providence is either slighted or neglected by People not helping themselves and not making use of the Occasions offered them by Providence God can and does usually with-draw his special Providence Conantes adjuvat exauditque deprecantes says St. Augustin My Lord the Game you have now to play is very nice and ticklesome The Religion King and Countries Ruine or Resurrection depends on it If you play it well you will carry all and save all but if you play it ill you will lose all and for ever All consists in resolving well how to dispose of Ireland in the present Conjuncture being the only Country that appears now for the King wherein you have two Parties to manage The one to wit the Protestant-Newcomers and Usurpers under the Rebellion of Cromwell are suspected or rather certain can nor will ever be Loyal or Faithful whatever Outward Shew or Promises they make Which is manifest by their several Instances in our Days both in England and Ireland The other Party to wit the Catholicks of Ireland proved still faithful and Loyal to the King at Home and Abroad though very ill recompensed Now the great question to be decided will be whether setting aside the manifest and incontestable Injustice of that most barbarous and inhumane Act they wrongfully call THE SETTLEMENT OF IRELAND Whether I say it is more politick and prudent to trim and temporize now with those Usurpers promising really or seemingly not to disturb them in their unjust Possessions than to restore the true ancient Proprietors turn off or rather secure the Usurper and make up a strong and potent Army all of True Loyal Faithful and Incorruptible Men without any mixture of Trimmers or Traytors I would think the Question thus Stated is soon resolved by natural Reason divers Instances and sad Experiences What Man of Sense or Reason can imagin that those who by their Rebellion cut off their King's Head like a Scelerate on a Scaffold banished his Queen and Children into Foreign Countries to beg their Bread for so many Years together and after the Heir's Restauration to his Crown not only put so many hard and unjust Conditions upon him namely that of excluding the Irish Catholicks from the Amnestly General but also used so many foul Means and Contrivances to murther and massacre him and his Brother together and seeing the King Issueless to use all their Endeavours to exclude the Brother from his lawful Birth-right and Succession to the Crown and when they could not by a Legal and Parliamentary way perform it at last draw Foreign Power into the Kingdom with whom by a most horrid Rebellion and most traiterous Defection they all join and turn him from his Throne and banish him with his Queen and Son the only lawful Heir of the Crown into Foreign Countries again placed a Foreigner upon the Throne in a Month's time after declaring the Crown vacant though he and his Son still alive All these barbarous and traiterous Transactions done within Forty Years time in the Face of the World By all which experiences the present King in his own Person passed but how can it be possible say you that the King having tried in his own Person all these Instances and Experiences with several others he could be thus impos'd upon and deluded I tell you by the same Reason that you may be now deceived if you are not cautious that is by want of Capacity and Sincerity in his Advisers telling him still he must do nothing that may irritate or provoke the Anger of the Protestants of England who are very dangerous That he must get them by fair means granting them all they desire nay preventing their desires by all good Offices and Marks of Kindness even to the Prejudice of his Crown and Dignity By this fair Politick they hindred him from drawing Succour out of Ireland sooner from making up a Catholick Army that would stick to him instead of a Protestant one that betrayed him hindered him also from having any Succour from France offer'd him Obliged him to declare that he had no Alliance with France and never to believe that the Dutch had any Design upon him or his Country till they were in the very Bowels of it Let any Man of Sense see if such rotten Principles and Politicks
By the Lord Lieutenant of the County of Kildare and one of His MAJESTIES most Honourable Privy Council Note The Copy of the First Order for Garrisoning the House of Ballisannan could not be gotten WHereas I have been informed That Ballysannan now belonging to Mr. Annesley was a House of Strength and therefore fit to have a Garrison and now being convinc'd of the contrary These are therefore in His Majesties Name to require you forthwith to remove your Men to their former Garrison out of the said House Given under my Hand this First day of April 1690. Charles White For Captain Patrick Nugent or the Officer in Chief Commanding the Troop at Kildare SIR THIS is to let you understand that I am Authoriz'd to give the Proprietor possession of the Lands of Ballysannan c. according to the Act of Parliament and that you may not be surpriz'd therein I give you this Notice from Sir Your Loving Friend and Servant Charles White Naas the 8th of April 1690. For John Annesly Esquire or in his Absence to Francis Annesly Esq These Second Order for Ballysannan WHereas Luke Fitzgerald Esquire has proved himself before me to be the Ancient Proprietor of the Town and Lands of Ballysannan and that his Ancestors were Posses'd of their Mansion-house there in the Year 1641. I do therefore in pursuance of His Majesties Orders unto me appoint the under-named Persons to give possession of the Mansion-house there to Luke Fitzgerald Esquire And for so doing this shall be your Warrant Given under my Hand and Seal this 6th day of May 1690. Charles White I do hereby appoint Captain Walter Archbold or Captain John Dillon of Athy to give possession of the Mansion-house of Ballysannan to Luke Fitzgerald Esquire An Account of Absentees Goods and how they were imbezelled THE beginning of March 1688. or before several Persons Officers of the Army who were impowered or pretended to be impowered by my Lord Deputy seized on the Goods of Absentees in most Counties of the Kingdom except the City of Dublin May 7th 1689. A Warrant comes to the Commissioners of His Majesties Revenue under His Majesties Privy Signet and Sign Manual dated April 29th 1689. to impower the Commissioners of the Revenue to call all such Persons to Account that had seiz'd any Goods or Chattels of Absentees May 9th 1689. The Commissioners of the Revenue issued out Instructions to several Persons in the respective Counties pursuant to His Majesties said Warrant As to the Country it must be observed That betwixt the 1st of March 1688. being the Time of seizing by the Officers of the Army and 9th of May 1689. when the Commissioners were impowered a great part of the Goods of Absentees were stolen or disposed The Officers that seiz'd were at the Camp at Denry and if any Accounts were return'd by them to the Lord Deputy the same never came to the Commissioners though they often endeavoured with the Secretary to find any such Accounts The Commissioners of the Revenue thereupon sollicited a Bill to pass in Parliament to vest the Goods of all Absentees in the King with some fitting Power to the Commissioners of the Revenue for the more easie and expeditious bringing all Persons to Account that had formerly seiz'd But this met with much delay and alterations At last the Bill pass'd the 18th of July 1689. and the Scope of it amounts to no more than to vest in His Majesty the Goods of such Persons only as are declared Forfeiting Persons by the Act of Attainder or Persons absent who abet or assist the Prince of Orange with exception of Minors and some Proviso's by the Act of Attainder most had time to return till the First of September and the general Clause of all Persons that have aided or abetted the Prince of Orange does not intitle the King without an Office found that such Persons did aid or abet and this requiring Proof and a Great Charge there did not appear sufficient profit to arise to answer the Charge Upon the whole Matter this Bill seemed rather to lessen the Zeal of those employed to seize Absentees Goods than otherwise when they consider'd that upon debate in Parliament it was denyed to pass a Law that should indemnifie them for more than half their Seizures even in the City of Dublin half the Persons whose Goods were there seized not being named in the Bill of Attainder However Aug. 9th 1689. The Commissioners of the Revenue having appointed four Provincial Surveyors gave them Instructions that the Surveyor General and the Collectors should dispose of the Stocks of Absentees whereby it appears that instead of neglecting that Matter of the Goods of Absentees they seemed rather to have given Order for the disposal of them before they were forfeited Septemb. 14th 1689. The Commissioners finding no satisfactory Returns from the Commissioners employed by them most of the Commissioners being in the Army or neglecting the Matter or applying the Goods to their own Use they superseded those Commissioners and lest the whole Matter to their Collectors which if done at first some profit might have redounded to His Majesty 2. The Goods of Absentees in the City of Dublin were not ordered by the Lord Deputy to be seized but the people observing what was done in the Country and there being free Transportation for England in March the Custom-house-Key became like a Fair and the most of Absentees Goods were then sent for England scarce any thing valuable was then left unless by the Carelesness of the persons employed by the Absentees The said 9th of August 1689. the Commissioners impowered several persons to seize the Goods of Absentees in the City of Dublin with like directions as the Lord Deputy gave formerly in other Counties viz. To inventory and take security for the forth-coming of these Goods and not to strip the Houses or hinder Trade for many Brewers Ale-sellers and other Handy-Crafts and Traders though absent yet had left behind them Servants Friends and sometimes their Wives to manage their Trade and to have strip't those Houses had but added to the Number of Wast Houses and lessened His Majesties Revenue some Ale-houses not having the Value of Forty Shillings of Absentees Goods draw three or four Barrels of Drink per Week besides their Quartering of Souldiers which has cost the Inhabitants more generally by far than the Goods could be sold for these Times And this Matter ought at present to be well considered for though now the Goods are vested in the King by Law and the best of them is to be made for the King's advantage yet Rotten Hangings will sell only to those that have the House No. 25. Albavilles Instructions to the Commissioners of Oyer and Terminer Gentlemen THE many Robberies Oppressions and Outrages committed through all parts of the Kingdom to the utter Ruine thereof and to the great Scandal of the Government as well is of Christianity forces his Majesty to a great resentment against those that prove
Regiment he with other his Associates having often before plundred broken and despoyled the Seats of our Church without interruption or disturbance resolved on Christmas-day at night to brake and plunder our Altar on which we had that day celebrated the Holy Communion and to that end he with two more about midnight entered the Church This Keating immediately attempted to brake one of the folding doors leading to the Communion Table and endeavouring with all his force to wrest the door from the hinges immediately as he thought saw several glorious and amazing Sights But one ugly Black Thing as he call'd it gave him a great Souse upon the Poll which drive him immediately into so great disorder that he tore all the Cloaths off his Back and ran Naked about the Streets and used all mad Bedlam pranks whatever He was put into the Dungeon where he remained for the space of 14. dayes without either Meat Drink Cloaths or any thing necessary for the support of nature would not take as much as a drop of cold water continually Rav'd of the Spoyls of the Church and saying That he took the most pains in breaking and taking off the Hinges and yet got the least share for his pains From the Dungeon he was removed to one Thomas Kelly's house in the Town where he behaved himself as in the prison neither eating bit nor drinking drop or admitting a ragg to cover his Nakedness and about eight dayes after he removed from the Dungeon dyed in a sad and deplorable manner I was so curious as to enquire of those that knew him very well whether ever he was Mad before or lyable to any such disorders they all assured me that they never knew any thing of that nature by him in the whole course of his life so that I think we may very well look upon it as the immediate Hand of GOD. SIR I dare assure you that this is a great Truth and so evident and manifest that it hath challeng'd and extorted an Acknowledgment from all parties whatever Neither the Romish Clergy nor any of the Officers of the Regiment who are all Papists do in the least disown it And it had this influence and effect upon all Souldiers and Papists that from that time forth never any of them were known to enter plunder or disturb our Church We have an account that another of Keatings companions at the very same time was struk Mad in the very act of breaking the Communion Table and that within very few hours after he dyed but they politickly conceal'd it and buryed him privately soon after for fear it should be known but the certainty of this I dare not Affirm but am sure some of their most sober and serious Clergy did freely own it George Prowd Trim 1st March 1689. No. 28. General Rosens ORDER to bring the Protestants Before Derry Conrade de Rosen Mareschal General of all his Majesties FORCES DEclares by these Presents To the Commanders Officers Souldiers and Inhabitants of the City of Londonderry That in case they do not betwixt this and Monday next at Six a Clock in the afternoon being the 1 st of July 1689. Agree to Surrender the said place of London-derry unto the KING upon such Conditions as may be Granted them according to the instructions and power Leiutenant General Hamilton formerly received from the KING That he will forthwith issue out his ORDERS from the Barony of Inishone and the Sea-Coasts round about as far as Charlemont for the gathering together of those of their Faction whether Protected or Not and cause them immediately to be brought to the Walls of London-derry where it shall be Lawful for those that are in the Town in case they have any pity for them to open the Gates and receive them into the Town otherwise they will be forced to see their Friends and nearest Relalations all starved for want of Food he having resolved not to leave one of them at home nor any thing to maintain them And that all hope of succour may be taken away by the Landing of any Troops in these parts from England He further Declares That in case they refuse to submit he will forthwith cause all the said Country to be immediately Destroy'd that if any Succour should be hereafter sent from England they may perish with them for want of Food Besides which he has a very considerable Army as well for the Opposing of them in all places that shall be judg'd necessary as for the Protecting all the rest of his Majesties dutiful Subjects whose Goods and Chattels he promises to Secure destroying all the rest that cannot be brought conveniently into such places as he shall judg necessary to be preserved and burning the Houses Mills not only of those that are in actual Rebellion but also of their Friends and Adherents that no hopes of escaping may be left for any man Beginning this very day to send his necessary Orders to all Governours and other Commanders of his Majesties Forces of Colerane Antrim Carrickfergus Belfast Dungannon Charlemont Belturbet Sligo and to Col. Sarsfield commanding a flying Army beyond Ballyshany Col. Sutherland commanding another towards Iniskillen and the Duke of Berwick another on the Fin-water to cause all the Men Women and Children who are any wayes related to those in Londonderry or any where else in open Rebellion to be forthwith brought to this place without hopes of withdrawing further into the Kingdom that in case before this said Monday the 1 st of July in the Year of our Lord 1689. be expired â—hey do not send Us Hostages other Deputies with a full sufficient power to Treat with Us for the Surrender of the said City of Londonderry on reasonable Conditions that they shall not after this time be admitted to any Treaty whatsoever And the Army which shall continue the Siege and will with the assistance of God soon reduce them shall have Orders to give no Quarter or spare either Age or Sex in case they are taken by Force But if they return to their Obedience due to their Natural Prince he Promises them that the Conditions granted them in his Majesties Name shall be Inviolably observed by all his Majesties Subjects and that He himself will have a care to Protect them on all occasions even to take their parts if any Injury contrary to the Agreement should be done them making Himself responsible for the performance of the Conditions on which they Agree to Surrender the said place of Londonderry to the KING Given under my Hand this 30th day of June in the Year of our LORD 1689. Le Mareschal Rosen No. 35. The Indictment of Dennis Connor in which the Counterfeit Letter to Mr. Will. Spike is inserted Term ' Hillar ' quinto sexto Jacobi Regis COm' Dublin ' Scilicet Juratores pro Domino Rege Sacrament ' suum dicunt proesent ' quod Dionisius Connor nuper de Dublin ' in Com' Civit ' Dublin ' Yeoman eâ—…o
beating and injuring Protestants ibid. 12. In disarming them p. 67 13. The Dispensing Power of more mischief still than ill Administration First Only to be allowed in Cases of Necessity ibid. 14. Secondly In such Cases the People have as much right to it as the King Instance in the Sheriff of Warwickshire from Dr. Sanderson p. 68 15. Thirdly The wickedness either in King or People in pretending Necessity where there is none p. 69 16. King James's employing Popish Officers was such a Dispensation ibid. 17. And no Necessity for it unless such as was Criminal p. 70 18. King James dispensed with all when it was against Protestants p. 71 Sect. 4. Thirdly King James's dealing with Civil Offices and the Privy Council p. 72 1. Several outed notwithstanding Patents ibid. 2. Act of Parliament for voyding Patents Irish hereby made Keepâ—rs of Records which before they had corrupted when they could get to them p. 73 3. Revenue Officers changed for Roman Catholicks though to the Prejudice of the Revenue p. 74 4. Sheriffs and Justices of Peace from the Scum of the People ibid. 5. Privy-Councellors all in effect Papists p. 76 Sect. 5. Fourthly King James's dealing with Corporations p. 77 1. The Peoples security in these Kingdoms is the choice of Representatives in Parliament To preserve this Papists excluded from Corporations in Ireland Protestants had made great Concessions to the King by their New Rules for Corporations The King not satisfied with this but would have all p. 77 78 2. Rice and Nagle's managing of Quo Warranto's a horrid Abuse of the Kings Prerogative and the Law p. 78 79 3. Other methods of destroying Charters p. 80 4. Particular Corporations in Dublin how ordered ibid. 5. Voyding Charters led to voyding Parents for Estates ibid. 6. Corporations by the New Charters made absolute Slaves to the Kings Will. First by Consequence no free Parliament could be Returned Secondly Protestants could not serve in the Corporations p. 80 81 7. Protestants hereby driven from the Kingdom ibid. Sect. 6. Fifthly King James's Destruction of the Trade p. 82 1. Trade to be destroyed that the King might have his Will of his Subjects Poor People willing to serve for little in an Army as in France ibid. 2. In order to ruin the Protestants who were the chief Traders Driven hereby out of the Kingdom p. 83 3. This ruined a great many that depended on them ibid. 4. The Irish in employ who had the ready Mony gave it only to Papist Tradesmen p. 84 5. Exactions of the Revenue-Officers great discouragement to Merchants and Traders p. 85 6. Protestant Shoopkeepers quitted for fear of being forced to Trust ibid. 7. Transportation of Wooll connived at by Lord Tirconnell to ruin our woollen Trade p. 86 8. Roman Catholick principal Traders ruined also by King James by the Act of Repeal p. 87 Sect. 7. Sixthly King James's Destruction of our Liberty p. 88 1. No general Pardon at King James's Accession to the Crown Protestants hereby questioned for things in the Popish Plot on false Evidences ibid. 2. Protestants sworn into Plots and seditious Words Instance 1. In County Meath 2. In County Tipperary p. 88 89 3. New Magistrates in Corporations plagued Protestants p. 90 4. New Levies and Rapparee's imprisoned those that resisted their Robberies Instance in Mr. Brice of Wicklow Maxwel and Levis Queens County Sir Laurence Parsons p. 91 5. General imprisonment of Protestants from Midsummer 1689. to Christmas No Habeas Corpus's allowed Protestants of Drogheda barbarously used at the Siege and of the County of Cork by imprisonments p. 92 93 6. Hard Usage of Protestants in Prisons Powder placed to blow them up Leak's Evidence against the Prisoners in Dublin defeated by an Accident p. 93 7. K. James aware of all the ill Treatment of Protestants informed at large by the Bishop of Limrick All Protestants confined by his Proclamation to their Parishes p. 94 8. Arts to conceal this in England Intollerable staying in Ireland Necessary to close in with King William p. 95 Sect. 8. Seventhly King James's destruction of our Estates 1. By disarming the Protestants by Lord Tirconnell p. 97 1. Government dissolved that does not preserve Property ibid. 2. The Irish very low at the Prince of Oranges's Invasion Would easily have been brought to submit Protestants able to have mastered them Lord Mountjoy opposed seizing Tirconnell p. 97 98 3. Protestants resolved not to be the Aggressors were inclined to submit to King James till they found his destructive designs Monsieur d' Avaux complained of the Measures put on King James by Tirconnell p. 98 99 4. Tirconnell's Arts and Lyes to gain time pretending to be ready to submit to King William till he form'd his new Levies Lord Chief Justice Keatings Letters and Observations on it p. 99 5. New Levies necessary to be subsisted on Plunder This gave credit to the Letter to Lord Mount Alexander Decemb. 6. 1688. p. 101 6. And made Derry shut its Gates against the Earl of Antrims Regiment p. 102 7. Obliged to do thus by their Foundation p. 103 8. Provoked to it by the unjust taking away their Charter p. 104 9. This made also the Enniskiliners refuse two Companies sent by Lord Tirconnell and the Northern Gentlemen to enter into an Association for their own defence ibid. 10. Lord Tirconnell hastened to run them into blood before King James's coming p. 106 11. Justification of their declaring for their present Majesties ibid. 12. Their defence of themselves of great benefit to the Protestant Cause and almost miraculous p. 107 13. Lord Tirconnell's Lyes and Wheedles to Lord Mountjoy to send him to France p. 109 14. Lord Mountjoy's Reasons to accept it Articles granted to him by Tirconnell for the Protestants not kept p. 110 15. Lord Tirconnell proceeds to disarm the Protestants Manner of doing it and taking away their Horses A perfect Dragooning p. 111 16. Proclamation issued after it had been done by verbal Orders p. 113 17. The Arms for the most part embezled by the Soldiers who took them This had like to have occasioned a worse Dragooning prevented by the Bishop of Meath p. 113 114 18. The manner of taking up and embezling Horses p. 114 19. Miserable condition of the Protestants being disarmed amongst their Irish Enemies Protestants had the highest Legal Property in their Arms. The Government by taking them away must design their ruin p. 115 20. No Reason for disarming us but to make us a Prey p. 116 21. It was necessary in King James's Circumstances but the Necessity occasioned by his own fault ibid. Sect. 9. Secondly Lord Tirconnell's Attempts on the Protestants Personal Fortunes p. 117 1. Which he destroyed by encouraging Popish Tenants against their Protestant Landlords and swearing them into Plots Gentlemen forced to live for some time before the Turn on their Stocks p. 117 118 2. Forced into England with little ready Mony Many burnt out of their Houses in the Country Many robbed and some murthered