LETTER II, TO THE EDITOR OF THE NORFOLK CHRONICLE. SIR, FTER a lapse of some months, during which I have been engaged in discussing topics of as great and general concern, as the claims of the catholics of this kingdom, on which I addressed you last May, I now resume the refutation of your charges against that body, as well as your objections to their claims, the time being very near when they will undergo another decision in the imperial senate. In my former letter I clearly shewed the groundlessness and injustice of your charge of INTOLERANCE against the church of Rome, and I proved, by the statement of various historical and incontrovertible facts, that the imputation more properly belonged to the professors of protestantism than to catholics; in this I shall continue to shew your ignorance and prejudice on this important question, and how incompetent you are, like others of your creed, whether connected with the press, or in the cabinet, or the senate, to do justice to it. Throughout the whole of your philippic, you have displayed a want of knowledge not surpassed in the worst days of puritan bigotry, which you have endeavoured to balance by the intro ORTHOD. JOUR. VOL. VIII. duction of a stock of assertions, not only void of truth, but some of them actually contradicted by the statute-book. This state of intellectual darkness, in these enlightened days, I have before admitted is not confined peculiarly to yourself, since we see a Peel, a Forster, a Marsh, and other men of talents and information on general subjects, exhibiting a similar blindness respecting the civil and religious principles of their catholic neighbours: blindness not only disgraceful, but, in my opinion, highly censurable, when such means are offered, through the press, of coming at a correct knowledge of them. For how can men legislate with that precision and justice which should mark the laws of a civilized nation, and more especially one that boasts of being free, when many of them are totally unacquainted with the exact state of the question they are called upon to discuss and decide, and others have but an imperfect notion of it? Or how can you, sir, undertake to direct the public mind, as a writer for the press, with accuracy and candour, when you are as unenlightened, regarding the real tenets of the catholic religion, as the great majority of your readers ? That I do not accuse you unjustly, I shall now proceed to shew, but first I will state your own words, B that nothing may be done unfairly | tions of lord George Gordon, or and partially : Mr. John Wesley, it matters not; they are founded on falsehood, and as you have made them your own, it is immaterial to know from whom they originally came. You object, it seems, in the first place, to the use of the term emancipation, since catholics have had numerous concessions, among which, not the least, you say, is the famous military officers' oath explanation act, which I have shewn in my Journal for August, 1817, was no concession at all; and this opinion was subsequently confirmed by a very able exposé of the act by a correspondent in the numbers for July and August, 1818. But why quarrel with us about the use of a word? This is certainly beneath the editor of a respectable press. Catholics are either in a state of restriction, notwithstanding the " numerous concessions" granted to them, or they are not. they are still under restraint, then is the term emancipation appropriately applied, which means a deliverance from slavery;" and that they are not free, you yourself not only admit, but you call upon your fellow-countrymen to join you in keeping them in a state of bondage, until they consent to give security If "It is not unworthy of remark, in this place," you say, ❝ that in the face of the numerous concessions that have already been made, (among which, though last, not least,' is the act in favour of military officers who are catholics,) the use of the term emancipation still continues; but this measure, when first proposed, was not ventured to be petitioned for totally and unqualifiedly. Relief from all disabilities was demanded, but not without the promise of securities; and when, in the progress of desire for political power, eligibility to seats in parliament was asked, those who supported the catholic cause were pledged on their side to the concession of the veto. This negative voice, in regard to the nomination of prelates of the Romish hierarchy in England and Ireland, is a just prerogative of the crown, and, in our apprehension, most essential to the maintenance of the PROTESTANT-ASCENDENCY, in the event of the present laws of exclusion being repealed; for the pope's authority extends not merely to matters of faith, but also to morals. The Roman pontiff claims and exercises supremacy also in secular concerns, such as the pay-for their good behaviour, in case ment of money for the maintenance they are set free. But, sir, before of the clergy, in whose hands, it is you again revile us as ungrateful particularly to be remembered, the for the concessions made, do pray engine of excommunication is placed; take a candid view of the conduct of a scourge which, to the dread of your ancestors towards the catholics, eternal punishment, superadds all when protestantism gained the asthe misery that flows from social cendency in Elizabeth's days, down privations; it is a weapon which the to the period when the first act of people of Ireland in particular well relief was passed, for I will not alknow to be no telum imbelle, but a low it to be a concession, and I sword of the keenest edge, unsheath-think you will have occasion to ed and used often on very trifling blush for their bigoted cruelty and accasions." oppressive injustice, as well as your own illiberality and disingenuousness. When the ministers of Elizabeth succeeded in reforming the church which her sister Mary had These, sir, are your statements ; whether you borrowed them from the writings of the late Dr. Duigenan, or owe them to the lucubra 66 restored to the privileges of former | the common sort of people as in the reign of queen Mary were both in deed and estimation GREAT MEN, because devoted to the Romish religion. These they held were to catholic nobility and clergy. By the stipulations of Magna-charta, right or justice could be sold to no man, denied to no man, deferred to no man. times, their first acts were directed to the compulsion of men's consciences to their new modes of faith, which were varied by acts of par Jiament with the same facility as a be thrust out of their places, and tax-bill, when found to be unpro-restrained by the rigour of the law. ductive. In confirmation of the And that none were to be employed latter part of this statement, I re- in any place of government, nor fer you to Dr. Heylin's History of chosen into any colleges of the unithe Reformation, and the statute versities, but protestants." Meabook will prove the accuracy of the sures emanating from such councils former. It is the common practice could not be advantageous to either with political writers at this day, civil or religious freedom; and acwho embrace the popular side, to cordingly we find the ascendency of extol the reign of Elizabeth as one protestantism followed by a train of of the most glorious and constitu- coercive laws, subversive of the tional that stand recorded in the just and mild maxims of the constiannals of our country. For my tution founded by catholic sovepart, however, I consider their ig-reigns, and fondly protected by the norance to be on the same level with the ultra - loyalists, whose measures they oppose; for a more despotic, cruel, and unjust sovereign never swayed the British sceptre than Elizabeth. Dr. Heylin says, the first parliament of this queen was a packed one. His words are these, Such lords and gentlemen as had the managing of elections in their several counties, retained such men for members of the house of commons as they conceived most likely to comply with their intentions for a reformation;" and Camden asserts, that some begged voices, as Norfolk and Arundel; others got voices by their cunning, as Cecil." The latter historian also tells us, that the queen "command-by law, and, by another act, aced the consultation to be hastened cording to Hume, "the crown was among her most inward counsellors; vested with the whole spiritual how the protestant religion might be power, to be exercised without the established, and the popish abo- concurrence of parliament, or even lished. The dangers they foresaw of the convocation : it might repress would be from the noblemen re all heresies, might establish or removed from the queen's council; peal all canons, might alter every from the bishops and churchmen point of discipline, might ordain or that were to be displaced; from the abolish any religious ceremony." judges that sat in the courts of jus- Here then we have an English tice; from the justices of peace in courtly protestant parliament conevery county; and from such of ceding absolute power to the sove 66 No freeman could be taken, or imprisoned, or disseized, (of his rights) or outlawed, or banished, or any ways destroyed, unless by the legal judgment of his peers, or by the law of the land.— These privileges, however, so essential to the security of the people, were soon evaded by the " good queen Bess;" for, in her first parliament, an act was passed inflicting a penalty of twenty pounds a month on every person not repairing to church. The ingenious doctrine of constructive treason was established |