The silence observed by you, on the whole Theology of the Question, was not dealing with fairness, by the vast and awful interests which surround it, and are involved in its decision. The captivating prospect held out by you, of some possible Political advantages, from the concession of the Claims, was any thing else than an honest answer, to the Religious scruples and anxieties of the great mass of the Christian public— nor could such persons feel better satisfied, with such a scanty and imperfect view of this great Question, as merely affected its subordinate parts, than they could feel, that the secondhand, and second-rate witticisms, of another Orator, were calculated to exhibit so great a Question, in its fair and equitable proportions. It is impossible, that I can impute to you, the intentional suppressio veri, (which is only half-sister to the suggestio falsi), but that all notice, of the sacred interests of RELIGION, was excluded from your address, must be obvious, to any, and all, who have perused it. I have before observed, that if this serious Question is to be argued, merely on Human principles, and without reference to the Eternal distinction, subsisting between Popery and Protestantism; the main reason, for refusing these Claims, is at once conceded, and the strongest, and best defence, of the Protestant Church and Cause, abandoned. It is for relinquishing this strong position, that I think you have, as a Religions Legislator, incurred a deep responsibility, before GOD and your Country. Many Senators, on a late occasion, who make no particular Profession of Religion, did, notwithstanding, the utmost in their power, for the Church of England, and the British Constitution, while they contended, upon Political grounds, for the impolicy and danger of conceding these Claims; but, as they reasoned without reference to the Spiritual part of the Question, they may be considered, as occupying an out-work, instead of the citadel. You, Sir, have, however, ventured much further, and have abandoned both citadel and out-works together; for you not only leave the Protestant Constitution to shift for itself, when you argue, that it can take no Political injury, but you equally consign the Protestant Church to its fate, when you

sink all notice of the Spiritual dangers which threaten it, and treat the anxieties, which are entertained by so many of its Members, as chimerical and groundless. Thus far of the sins of omission, which characterised your public defence of Mr. PLUNKETT'S Bill. I shall consider in my next, the sins of commission, which appear in it;

And am, Dear Sir,

Your most obedient and faithful Servant,

AMICUS PROTESTANS.

DEAR SIR,

LETTER XXII.

Your public defence of the Romish Claims, opens with a hypothetical intimation that stopping short with "conceding the elective franchise to the Irish Catholics, was a gross error in policy, and a violation of justice," which is followed by an assertion, that "there is the greatest danger in remaining in our present situation, while in advancing further, and pursuing the course recommended by this Bill, there would be not only the greatest expediency, but the greatest security." So that we have here, the striking inconsistency of a Protestant Legislator, of high Religious professions, anxious to do more for Popery, than she herself would a few years since have dared to ask; and, although the warmest Protestant advocates of the Romish Elective Franchise, renounced when they sought it, all intention of ever proceeding an inch beyond it, as both inexpedient and hazardous, and accepted that concession, on the express condition of the Roman Catholics being content with it, and asking no more; you, Sir, upon the modern Roman Catholics, and their Protestant allies, now declaring they are not content, and must have more, are justifying their importunate demands-are denying a danger once admitted, even by the advocates of the Claims themselves; and, standing on the Pisgah of an unsound and giddy elevation, are seeing, or dreaming you see,

in the distant and unclouded horizon-1st, "the greatest danger in remaining as we are,” that is to say, in remaining Protestant, free, and happy; 2dly," the greatest expediency in advancing further, and passing Mr. PLUNKET'S Bill"-that is, in permitting Papists to be Members of both Houses of Legislation, Privy Councellors, Judges, Officers of State, Colonial Governors, Sheriffs, and Magistrates; and 3dly, "the greatest security," in the same measure, that is, the greatest security to a Church and Constitution, which are fundamentally and exclusively Protestant, in making such revolutionary and radical changes in the very essence and substance of the Church and State, as no real Protestant ever contemplated without dismay, before that liberal and loving æra in which we have the delightful misfortune of living-an æra in which, as was once happily said of a similar age of gold, men are dispensed from the love of their neighbour, by their love of the Tartars and Caffrees.

The next point taken by you, is, that one of the discoveries reserved for late times, is that "persecution for Religious opinions, is not only one of the wickedest, but one of the weakest things in the world;" you then attempt to identify the original conquest, and subsequent government of Ireland, with "a persecution for Religious opinions ;" and after alledging that the claims of the Catholics ought to have been conceded at the Union, as guaranteed by Mr. PITT, and that you knew of nothing more calculated to keep the people of Ireland in a state of insurrection, than the speech of a certain Member, you leave the inference full and direct, that all hostility to the Catholic Claims, is a persecution for Religious opinions; therefore, that all who lend themselves to such persecution, are both weak and wicked-that the Romish Claims became due at the Irish Union, as a matter of right-and that to oppose them now, is to keep the people of Ireland in a state of insurrection.

Upon these remarks I observe--1st. That, to put the opposition to the Roman Catholic Claims, even by implication, upon the footing of A RELIGIOUS PERSECUTION, is as illogi

cal as it is unjust: but as I mean to consider this point in replying to MELANCTHON, I shall not dwell upon it now.

1

2dly. The circumstance of Mr. PITT, having given a pledge for this concession at the time of the Union, has never been proved; but if he did so, it could only be the pledge of an Individual, to which pledge, not even the Cabinet-much less the Parliament-and, least of all, the KING, ever became parties. It is inconsistent with all we know of Mr. PITT'S character, for prudence and policy, to imagine that he ever promised what he must have known was beyond his power to perform: The proof of such a promise, if he had ever given it, would not be difficult to procure; but if it could be produced (as it never has been, and perhaps never will be), I should still contend, that while Mr. PITT had no moral right to stake the Church of England, and the British Constitution, even for the political measure of the Union (however desirable in itself), so the opinion, which he is supposed to have formed in favour of the Claims, (however entitled to respect) was not infallible, and must, after all, be received with such allowance as is due to the opinion of a Statesman, who cannot, in the utmost judgment of charity, be supposed to have entered far into the spiritual part of the subject, nor to have viewed it in relation to the Church of Christ, and the interests of vital Religion.

3dly. With respect to your apprehensions of Irish insurrection in consequence of any arguments against the Claims, or of any opposition offered to them, I would say with Dr. YOUNG:

"Be good-and let Heav'n answer for the rest." Duty is ours-events are not. It is rather a curious circumstance that Mr. DANIEL O'CONNELL, the Romish Advocate of the Claims, feels the same apprehension of insurrection from the passing of the Relief Bill, as you, Sir, entertained from the Speeches against it. In the Dublin Patriot, of the 1st of May, 1821, we find this Gentleman congratulating his. countrymen, on the overthrow of the Bill, in the following terms:-" I speak advisedly, when I say that a sanguinary

insurrection would, I am convinced, have immediately followed his enactments." Such was the gratitude which (if Mr. O'CONNELL is to be believed), was to have followed the boon, which we were taught to believe, we were about to confer on our Romish countrymen.

With regard, Sir, to your own apprehensions, I would observe that, if it be once admitted that the Religion of the State is the Religion of Holy Scripture, I apprehend we may fairly look for the blessing of GOD, upon our continuing to stand by that profession of faith, rather than upon our contributing to the extension and support of one which we profess to be unscriptural in itself, and perilous to the soul. If the national faith be not from above, the sooner we abandon its defence the better; but if it be, let us "quit ourselves like men," in spite of the terrors of insurrection. To surrender our privileges, for fear we may lose them, and to throw down our arms, because we may be beat, will resemble the miserable policy of HENRY IV. of France, who renounced even his Religion, in order to save his life, notwithstanding that the ALMIGHTY had saved him, when a Protestant, from the Popish Massacre of St. Bartholomew, and the Religious convulsions which followed it. Scarcely had he apostatized from the Protestant faith, when the very event happened, which he had changed his Religion in order to avoid, and he perished by the hands of a Papist!—If we can find no better reason, for conceding the Romish Claims, than that Ireland may be preserved from insurrection, ought we not to be certified that the very insurrection we dread may not be a necessary consequence of our folly, and a judicial punishment of HIM (who has saved us hitherto) for our distrust of his continued Providence, and our desertion of that cause which he has honoured and protected as his own, against a world in arms? Will you, Sir, undertake to shew, that when all but the Throne and the Church shall have been surrendered by that timid policy which shrinks from maintaining the position which GOD has assigned to us, we shall not, after all, be involved in an insurrection, in order to de→