CATHOLIC HATRED OF IRISH PROTESTANTISM. THE Standard has this brief
description of an attack on the house and life of Mr. HouG, the Protestant Curate (not the tithe-owning Rector) of Cloone, in Leitrim, which is also noticed in our depart- ment of Irish news— "Ills lonely dwelling is surrounded at midnight by an armed banditti; it is set in flames; and when with his family he attempts to escape by fording a deep and rapid river, the only point of egress left unguarded, and so left because it was deemed impassable, the fugitive for life is tired upon int he stream. There, English reader, there is a picture for you."
An Irish clergyman, who has amplified the story in a letter to the Standard, says that the only incentive to this murderous assault was hatred of Protestantism ; and the Tory journal agrees with the veracious parson in asserting that the war " is waged against the Protestant religion ;" and that if tithes are abolished, "assassination will be resorted to with more prodigality." The whole population of the district are charged with being accom- plices in the savage crime.
" Nor is it to be overlooked, that this conspiracy of assassins must be known to the whole neighbourhood through which it is dispersed. Yet no warning of his danger was given to the devoted der* man, or of the danger to which they were exposed with him, to any of his un ffending servants. No hint was sup. plied to any neighbouring Magistrate 01' Peace-officer to be at hand, at least to prevent the crime, if not to punish the criminals. The intended assassination must have been known to thousands, any one of whom might have prevented the attempt without compromising the safety of a human being."
Let us suppose that this account is substantially correct; and that (which is scarcely credible) Mr. HOGG had not quarrelled wills any of his parishioners,—that he was an inoffensive person, and no tithe-owner. Let us also assume that the only motive of the incendiary assassins was hatred of Protestantism. It will then become a subject of inquiry, how it happens that in Ireland the Protestant religion is hateful, and its ministers the victims of midnight murder?
The fault is not in the religion itself; for it inculcates for- giveness of injuries and kindness to all. Men may differ as to the evidences of Christianity, or as to different forms of Chris- tian worship and articles of speculative faith; but hostility or hatred to a mild and merciful religion cannot exist unless among maniacs.
Neither can it be said that there is inherent brutality in the nature of Irishmen. On the contrary, they are generous and affectionate. In the army, they are tractable as well as brave. In the United States, they arc among the most valuable citizens. In this country, we have no outbreaks against Protestantism, though probably there are at least a million of the lower class of Irish in England. On the Continent, Protestants and Catholics live together in peace and harmony. It is only in Ireland that the abhorrence of Protestantism is exhibited in outrages on the lives and property of its clergy.
There is but one conclusion to be drawn from these facts. We must not blame the religion—we must not blame the people; but the means by which the State Church is upheld. In the history of that Church and the conduct of its ministers, we find the real cause of that deadly hatred to Protestantism which the Tories impute as a crime to the poor Irish Catholics. We cannot sepa- rate the religion itself from its baneful accessories. With the preaching of Protestanism, Ratheormac is connected in the minds of the people. The support of the Protestant religion has ever been, in Ireland, the pretext for political oppression, and ecclesiastical imprisonments and slaughters: and how is it pos- sible that the sufferers can look upon the ostensible cause of blood and tyranny except as an abomination? Gross, therefore, is their hypocrisy, or almost incredible is their stupidity, who profess to believe that a continuance of the existing system, and a vigorous execution of the laws, which were made to put the foot of the Protestant parson on the neck of the Catholic cottier, will stop theoutrages which have arisen as a natural consequence from tl at system and those laws. Instead of denouncing the criminal, we should remove the incentive to crime.
Such is not the remedy proposed by the Standard. Persecu- tion, imprisonment, and the musket, have been employed in the
service of the Irish Church for centuries. British soldiers have been degraded into tithe-collectors, and employed in hunting the Irish like wild beasts through their land. The State Church has, in Mr. Sum's words, "cost England millions of her treasure, and Ireland torrents of her blood ;" and the result is, that not only is it almost impossible to collect tithes, but Protestant clergymen, represented to be mild in demeanour, and not immediately con- nected with tithes, are forced to fly from their burning glebe- houses, to escape being shot by the peasantry among whom they dwell. Yet with these facts before him, the Tory journalist writes as follows-
" The power of the will of England, known to all, is more exactly appre- ciated by none than by the rebel party of the Roman Catholics of Ireland. They feel that power ; they groan under it ; they confess it in their writhing. and their ravings—most unequivocally of all, in their poltroon affectation of contempt for it. Let the people of England, then, unanimously and emphatic- ally declare, that while England can command a guinea or a musket, the reli- gion of our martyrs shall be maintained in Ireland ; and both modes of the anti.Protestant war—tithe resistance, and assassination—will cease. On the other hand, if we, by our apathy,' leave hope to the conspirators, that their blockade process, or their murder process may prevail in the end, we make i ourselves in no small degree chargeable with all the miseries still to be inflicted upon virtuous and pious men persecuted,—with all the blood of saints and mar- tyrs still to be shed."
The short and sufficient reply to all this is—that the plan, after an experiment of centuries, has failed. Tyranny and bloodlet- ting have been proved to be unavailing; now try the effect of mercy and justice. " Do unto others as you would be done by."
As for the emphatic and unanimous declaration of the People of England, which the Standard calls for—pshaw ! the People of England are not going to encounter the utter ruin of a civil war in the futile attempt to cram the Church of Ireland down seven millions of Catholic mouths.
Previous page
