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reign.

the two last acts recorded of him, previously to the conclusive battle; namely, the appointment, in a Romish college at Kilkenny, of certain Popish priests to benefices in the diocese of Meath, from which the lawful incumbents had been forcibly driven; and the establishment, by royal charter, of a new Benedictine nunnery in Dublin, the patent for which bears date the 15th of June, 1690, a fortnight before his final defeat and dethronement. To the Character of his Church of Ireland his reign, almost from its commencement to its conclusion, was a calamitous series of fallacious promises, of violated pledges, of unconstitutional and tyrannical decrees, of arbitrary impositions, of oppressions and persecutions the most. bitter and relentless. These evils probably were the dictates of wicked counsellors, rather than of his own free will; but they resulted from his determination to incur any danger in order to the establishment of Popery. However this be, his failure was of incalculable importance to the religious condition of Ireland; for it laid a check for awhile in the British empire on the aspiring, the restless, and the unchangeable spirit of that domineering power, and restored her legitimate rights and privileges, as previously secured, to the Church.

Actuated by a lively sense of the deliverance achieved for her by the victory of the Boyne, the ministers of the Church, resident in Dublin and its vicinity, waited in a body on the conqueror in his camp, and by the mouth of the venerable Bishop of Meath, who had been their great advocate in affliction, and who now conducted their rejoicing assembly, tendered to King William an address, expressive of their congratulations, their loyalty, and their

Congratulations
King William.

of the clergy to

St. Patrick's.

prayers for his welfare'. On the following Sunday, July the 6th, Dopping, bishop of Meath, and Digby, bishop of Limerick, with all the clergy who were in Dublin and its neighbourhood, the Primate having excused his non-appearance by reason of his great age and infirmities, attended his triumphant procesThanksgiving at sion to St. Patrick's cathedral, whither he repaired to return thanks for his success. There a sermon was preached by Dr. King, who had been elected not long before to the deanery, commemorating the power, and wisdom, and the providence of God, in the protection of his people, and the defeat of their enemies. And this was followed by the king's permission for the appointment of a day of solemn thanksgiving, and for composing an occasional form of prayer. Thus pure religion, rescued from the encroachment of "Popish tyranny and arbitrary power," was again established by God's good providence in Ireland, under the safeguard of the law: and rescued from the arbitrary and tyrannical proscriptions of the Popish king, as she had been not long before delivered from the sectarian persecutions of the republican usurpation, the Church of Ireland was again vindicated and secured as part of the constitution of the kingdom; having all along, and independently of all secular support, preserved her character of a true and sound part of the holy Catholick and Apostolick Church of Christ, by her three orders of the ministry, transmitted in an unbroken line from the apostles, and by her preaching of the pure word of God, and her ministering of the sacraments, according to primitive usage, as embodied in her Book of Common Prayer.

Restoration of the Church.

4

• WARE'S Bishops, p. 161.

5 MASON, p. 211,

her progress.

the Romish

That this Apostolical and Scriptural Church was obstructions to not at the same time enabled to exert her influence, and dispense the means of grace, over the whole kingdom and all its inhabitants, must be matter of the most sincere and deep concern with those who are capable of justly estimating her excellence. But whatever efforts now or at any other time were directed to that end, they were counteracted by impediments inherent in the politico-religious condition of the country, especially by the indefatigable energy and predominant influence of the Romish Counteraction of hierarchy and priesthood, which annulled all freedom hierarchy. of thought and action in the Popish community, so as to preclude the operation of Christian truth upon their minds, whilst they put forth all their powers for the secular aggrandisement and profit of their party. This object had been fully unfolded and boldly avowed in the last miserable reign, when every exertion was used for placing in the hands of the Papists all the property and political power of the kingdom. Such was the aim of their united efforts. And never can it be enough lamented that the united energies of Protestantism could not be brought into action on the other side; but that sectarianism was permitted Evil influence to divert the natural resources, to weaken the powers, and to diminish the authority, of the Church; and thus to impede her efficacy in driving away the erroneous and false doctrines of Popery, and in spreading over the kingdom the blessings of the reformed and pure faith of Christ, and his ordinances, as professed and maintained in her Apostolical communion.

of sectarianism.

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CATALOGUE of the ARCHBISHOPS and BISHOPS who are ascertained to have occupied the SEES of the CHURCH of IRELAND, during the period comprised within the foregoing narrative, commencing in the year of our Lord 1535, the twenty-sixth of the Reign of King Henry the Eighth, and ending in 1690, the year of the Abdication of King James the Second, with the Birth-place or Country of each Prelate, his previous Station in the Church, the dates of his Succeding to, and Vacating, his Bishoprick, and his Translation, if any.

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