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joined to the peculiar circumstances of irritation arising from the history of Ireland, that that country is always in danger of such insurrections as those of the Jacquerie in France, of Wat Tyler in England, and the peasants Germany;-insurrections, not for imaginary rights, and privileges which can only attach to a few opulent individuals---not for seats in parliament, and the 40 offices, but for emancipation in a more genuine and alarming sense of the word, for revenge and for rapine. Never was there a land in a state so disgraceful to its rulers, and its wealthy inhabitants. Never in any part of the world, nor in any period of history, have four millions of men existed in circumstances so fearful and so humiliating to human nature.---Having for seven centuries been subject to England, being now united to it, and lying almost within sight of it---of a country where the arts and comforts of civilization are carried to a higher pitch than they ever attained elsewhere, the great mass of the Irish people are at this moment, in their bodily condition, worse than slaves, and, in their moral condition, worse than savages. Pestilence, perpetual warfare, bloody superstitions, and the difficulty of pro

curing food, keep down the number of men in other countries wherever they thus approach to the state of wild beasts. Government, and their geographical situation, preserve the Irish from three of these evils, and against the fourth they are secured by the use of a root, of all others the most produc tive, and the most easily cultivated; and, in this state of degradation, they are enabled to increase and multiply, so as to be truly styled the great and growing majority. Meantime their whole education is confined to the mere forms and vulgarest fables of their false faith, the very dregs and fæces of the most corrupt Catholicism. They have no other intercourse with those who should, by their presence, and influence, and labours of love, be gradually improving and humanizing them, than what is just sufficient to excite in them all rancorous and mutinous feelings; and the knowledge which they possess serves only to supply the means, and increase the power, of mischief. They are gifted with a quickness of feeling, and with all the elements of genius, perhaps in a degree above all other people; and yet these very endowments, which, if well culti vated, might produce such infinite

Messings, serve only, in their present miserable condition, to render them more sensible of wrong, more tenacious of resentment, and more eager for revenge.

For these people Catholic emanon can do nothing;---a Cathoablishment might do much; but, thoh it would remove much misery, it would perpetuate so much evil, that it is no more to be thought of than Harrington's extraordinary proposal of selling Ireland to the Jews. This however, is the ultimate object of the se petitioners who have any objec, at all, and this would readily be conceded by the majority of their advocates; a number, happily so inconsiderable, that there is no reason to be alarmed at their disposition. No opinion has been more loudly and insolently maintained by men who disguise their irreligion, under the name of liberality, than that nations are to be suffered to enjoy their superstitions however monstrous; that no attempt should be made to shake their faith and supplant it by a better; and that the established religion of every country should be that of the majority of its inhabitants. The ground of these political dogmas is a heartless and hopelessPyrrhonism, and that desperate moral atheism, which, resolving all things into expediency, considers truth and falsehood as equally indifferent in themselves. Even upon their own grounds these reasoners might be confuted. For, were it admitted that truth is not to be attained, and that there is no resting place for the heart and hopes of man,---that which is false may still be proved to be so ;---the specific evils which originate in such falsehood can be demonstrated from history and experience, and it is our duty to prevent those conse

quences. Wherever the Roman Catholic superstition predominates, it offers only these alternatives :---Unbelief, with scarce a decent covering of hypocrisy, and all the abominations of vice, as exhibited in Italy and France, among the higher ranks; or base, abject, degrading, destructive bigotry in all, as in Spain, Portugal, and the Austrian States. These are the effects which always have been, and always must be, produced by a Catholic establishment. Whatever good, therefore, might immediately be obtained by the complete restoration of Popery, would be more than counterbalanced by the subsequent evil.

This complete restoration and reestablishment is what the Catholics look on to, and without it they never will be satisfied by any conciliations, as long as the slightest hope of obtaining it remains. They tell us in their petition, what we may well be ashamed to hear, that their religion has been deemed, in a considerable degree, to merit public encouragement. The folly which has been committed in granting to them, as Catholics, any thing more than toleration, justifies them in this strange assertion, and would encourage them to demand farther concessions, till nothing farther should be left to concede. Happily we have stopt in time; for, notwithstanding the triumphant language of the emancipators in parliament, that preliminary measure never can be carried without raising an opposition which no prudent ministry will venture to provoke. We are too apt to judge of the stream by the straws which float upon the surface, forgetful that the main body of the waters flows in an under current. A few newspapers and journalists might be bought,

a few pulpits might be manned for the occasion--pamphleteers might be set on, and literary partizans would volunteer their services; but if there were serious cause to apprehend that the King could be persuaded to yield his reluctant consent to this repeal of the Test Act, or that his successor inclined to such a measure, the church would rouse up its sleeping strength, it would be joined on that occasion by the orthodox dissenters, and England and Scotland would unite in one cry of petition, too loud and general to be resisted. On this question Mr Wilberforce represents a body of people twenty-fold more numerous than the freeholders of the great county which has elected him. The question, in fact, resolves itself to this,---are the Catholics right in those great and essential points of doctrine and discipline wherein they differ from the church of England---or are they wrong? If right, it behoves us to put an end to what, in that case, must be considered our mortal heresy, and to atone for it in sackcloth and ashes ;---if wrong, we are bound by our own principles to tolerate them, indeed, to the full extent of toleration, but in no way to afford the slightest encouragement or assistance to a system so erroneous and so pernicious, a system which, wherever it has not proved deadly to intellect, has been deleterious to morals, and has, in most cases, equally degraded both. No considerations of temporary interest can ever justify us in compromising the cause of truth. Wherever the points of religious difference could come into

e use

action, the exclusive tests must be perpetuated---in all other cases they ought to be removed. Very few such cases remain at present. One, however, was brought before parliament, a few days af- Ma 30. ter the great debate by Sir John Newport, who proposed duc solution, declaring Catholics entele to the high offices of the bank of Ireland. It was again brought forward by Lord Henry June 2 Petty, and again negatived, Mr Foster and Mr Perceval yging the singular objection, that thes tholics themselves had not ask for it. Lord Hawkesbury opposed it in the upper house, June 16. upon the ground, that his determination was to make his stand at the act of union, to maintain the laws as they stood at that period; to abide by the concessions that had been made up to that period, but not to accede to any other that had since been called for. This was a manlier answer, but it had been wiser to have granted what was asked---better still to have granted it unasked. It is unjust to the Catholics to exclude them from situations of profit;---it would be unjust to ourselves to admit them to situations of political power. This is the distinction. Our constitution consists of church and state; is it not, therefore, a selfevident absurdity to give those persons power in the state, who are hostile to the church ?---Happily the Catholics have relieved their parliamentary friends from all further obligation, by disavowing the terms which were proposed for them.

THE conduct of Marquis Wellesley in India, which had been arraigned during the two preceding administrations, was finally discussed in the present sessions. The accusations against him had originally been brought forward by Mr Paull, a man whose singular career will be hereafter recorded in history, little to his own honour, but still less to that of others. The personal dislike which was felt towards him, and his want of rank, influence, and connections, occasioned his talents to be estimated lower than they deserved; and as the situation in which the Marquis stood induced both parties to favour him, one by directly justifying his measures, the other by impeding his accuser, nothing farther had been done than to publish a mass of papers, so voluminous that it was scarcely possible any member of parliament could have time to peruse them. Mr Paull being no longer in the house, part of the business devolved upon Lord Folkestone, he being the person who had given him the most effectual and sincere supFeb. 9. port. In the very outset of the discussion he found him

self in the singular predicament of having those only to approve of his plan of proceeding, who were against him on the merits of the question; while they who were with him on the merits ohjected to the plan. The case which he stated was this :---In 1798, the East March 9. India Company deposed the Nabob of Oude, who was an usurper, and placed the lawful heir upon the musnud. A treaty was then concluded between them, stipulating that the defence of the province, against all enemies, internal or external, should rest with the company, for which the Nabob should pay, by monthly instalments, an annual subsidy of seventy-six lacks of rupees, (912,000l.) That, for this purpose, the Company should constantly maintain in Oude a force of from ten to thirteen thousand men, and, if more were at any time required, the Nabob should defray the expence of the difference. That if, at any time, the monthly instalments were in ar rears, the Company should require security for its future regular payment. All political power, and even all communication with other states,

was taken from the Nabob, but full authority over the internal affairs of the country, over his household affairs, hereditary dominions, troops, and subjects, was left to him by the express words of the treaty; and it was stipulated, that a reform in the civil and military arrangements of the country should be set about, concerning which he was to advise with the Bengal government. Four months after this treaty was signed, Lord Wellesley arrived in India, and immediately formed a plan in direct opposition to it, for the total reduction of the Nabob's troops. It was, however, above a twelvemonth before he had any leisure to carry it into effect; and, during that time, the Nabob faithfully performed his part of the contract, paying the subsidy punctually, and reducing his troops, which it was his wish and his interest to do, because his predecessors had won them by unbounded largesses. This he effected by forbidding any vacancies to be filled, except in those battalions on which he could depend. No sooner, however, had Lord Wellesley destroyed the power of Tippoo, than he began to execute his projects upon Oude. He ordered additional troops to march into the country, to guard against the threatened invasion of Zemaur Shah. This was a mere pretext, they were continued there after the death of the Shah and the dismemberment of his dominions. Lord Wellesley's plea was, that it was impossible to defend the country, as he was bound to do, without maintaining at all times in it a force sufficient to resist remote and contingent danger; but his real object was to overburthen the treasury of the Nabob, so as to make him disband his own troops, and to extort from him a cession of

territory, while, at the same time, the Company's finances might be conveniently relieved. Statesmen and Governors acquire a cheap reputation by succeeding in their measures, when their power is such as to render success certain, and they have no scruples concerning the means which they employ. The Nabob was compelled to disband his own troops,

those of the Bengal government were in possession of his country, and he was completely at Lord Wellesley's mercy. No retrenchments which he could make were sufficient; the country was exhausted, and he himself, harassed by renewed and increasing applications, expressed apprehensions that the subsidy could not be regularly paid, protesting, at the same time, that he would use his best endeavours to fulfill the agreement, and offering to lay open the state of his affairs to the English Resident Colonel Scott, and to consult with him how to provide the necessary funds. Overlooking this offer, Lord Wellesley insisted upon a cession of territory, the annual revenue of which should equal the full amount of the subsidy. This was not all; over and over again he required the transfer to the Company of the exclusive management of the civil and military government of the country. In this, however, he was disappointed. A very protracted negociation ensued, in which, on the one side, all the arts of chicanery were displayed, accompanied with threats the most undisguised, and language of reproach and reviling, the most contentious and unmerited; while, on the other hand, nothing was manifested but patient forbearing and earnest supplications. A demand of 38 lacks of rupees was required to be paid instantaneously. This sum had in