The Irish Race in the Past and the Present Part 39

Even if, in the midst of some of the extremities to which they had been reduced, they had at any time resolved to conform and take the oaths prescribed, all their miseries would have been at an end, and their immediate admission to all the rights and privileges of British citizens secured. From time to time, in individual cases, they witnessed the sudden and magical effect produced by conformity on the part of those who gave up resistance altogether, and who, from whatever motive, bowed to the inevitable conditions on which men were admitted to live peaceably on Irish soil, and to the enjoyment of the blessings of this life; such condition being the abjuration of Catholicity.

But so few were found to take advantage of this easy chance forever held out to them, that a man might well wonder at their constancy did he not reflect that they set their duty to G.o.d above all things. The fact is patent--they had a conscience, and knew what it meant.

Having then surrendered their all for the sake of their religion, the free exercise of that might at least have been left them; and since the choice lay between the two alternatives of enjoying the natural right of worshipping their G.o.d or submitting to all the sacrifices previously mentioned (seemingly the meaning of the various oaths prescribed by law), it can only be looked upon as an additional cruelty to violently deprive them of what they chose to preserve at all cost. But the authors of the statutes did not see the matter in this light. They could not lose such an opportunity of inflicting new tortures on their victims; on the contrary, they would have considered all their labor lost had they not endeavored to coerce the very thing least subject to coercion, the religious feeling of the human soul. Accordingly, the resolution was taken to deprive them of every possible facility for the exercise of their religion, that the fire within might give no sign of its warmth.

True, the Irish Catholics were not, as the Christians under the edicts of old Rome, to be summoned before the public courts and there abjure their religion or die. It is strange that the rulers of Ireland stopped short at this; that they invented nothing in their laws at least equivalent, unless the statutes that compelled every person under fine to be present at Protestant worship on Sundays be interpreted to mean, what it very much resembles, an attempt at coercion of the very soul.

Still there was no edict openly proscribing the name of Catholic, and punishing its bearer with death.

But the measures adopted and actually enforced were in reality equivalent, and would more effectually than any pagan edict have produced the same result, if the Irish race had shown the least wavering in their traditional steadiness of purpose.

The first of the measures devised for this end would have been completely efficacious with any other people or race. It was a twofold measure: 1. All bishops, priests, and monks, were to depart from the kingdom, liable to capital punishment should they return. 2. All laymen were to be compelled to a.s.sist at the Protestant service every Sunday, under penalty of a fine for each offence: the fine mounting with the repet.i.tion of the offence, so that, in the end, it would reach an enormous sum.

Only let such a policy as this be persevered in for a quarter of a century in any country on earth except Ireland, and, in that country the Catholic religion will cease to exist.

"The Catholic clergy," says Matthew O'Connor--and the reader will remember he was a witness of what he described-- "submitted to their hard destiny with Christian resignation. They repaired to the seaport towns fixed for their embarcation, and took an everlasting farewell of their country and friends, of every thing dear and valuable in this world. Many of them were descending in the vale of years, and must have been anxious to deposit their bones with the ashes of their ancestors; they were now transported to foreign lands, where they would find no fond breast to rely upon, no 'pious tear' to attend their obsequies.

Yet their enemies could not deprive them of the consolations of religion: that first-born offspring of Heaven still cheered them in adversity and exile, smoothed the rugged path of death, and closed their last faltering accents with benedictions on their country, and prayers for their persecutors.

"Such as were apprehended after the time limited for deportation, were loaded with irons and imprisoned until transported, to attest, on some foreign sh.o.r.e, the weakness of the government, and the cruelty of their countrymen. Some few, disabled from age and infirmities from emigration, sought shelter in caves, or implored and received the concealment of Protestants, whose humane feelings were superior to their prejudices, and who atoned, in a great degree, by their generous sympathy, for the wanton cruelty of their party.

"The clause inflicting the punishment of death on such as should return from exile was suited only for the sanguinary days of Tiberius or Domitian, and shocked the humanity of an enlightened age. William of Orange, whose necessities compelled him to give his sanction to the clause, would never consent to its execution."

Nevertheless, it was afterward enforced on several occasions, and, during the whole century of penal laws, it not only remained on the statute-book ad terrorem, but whatever clergyman disregarded it could only expect to be treated with its utmost rigor. From Captain South's account, it appears that in 1698 the number of clergy in Ireland consisted of four hundred and ninety- five regulars and eight hundred and ninety-two seculars; and the number of regulars shipped off that year to foreign parts amounted to four hundred and twenty-four--namely, from Dublin, one hundred and fifty-three; from Galway, one hundred and ninety; from Cork, seventy-five; and twenty-six from Waterford.

But such a measure was of too sweeping a character to be carried out to the letter; many of the proscribed priests, seculars for the most part, escaped the pursuit of the government spies, and remained concealed in the country. The bishops had all been obliged to fly; but a few years later, under Anne, several returned, for they knew that, without the exercise of their religious functions, the Catholic religion must have perished; and, in order that they might continue the succession of the priesthood, confirm the children, and encourage the people to stand firm in their faith, they ran the hazard of the gibbet. Of this fact the persecutors soon became aware, and the Commons of Ireland declared openly that "several popish bishops had lately come into the kingdom, and exercised ecclesiastical jurisdiction within the same, and continued the succession of the Romish priesthood by ordaining great numbers of popish clergymen, and that their return was owing to defect in the laws."

To cover this defect, they invented the "registry law." They did not state in express terms their intention of exporting them again, but their object was clearly manifested by the subsequent enactment of 1704. By the registry law "all popish priests then in the kingdom should, at the general quarter sessions in each county, register their places of abode, age, parishes, and time of ordination, the names of the respective bishops who ordained them, and give security for their constant residence in their respective districts, under penalty of imprisonment and transportation, and of being treated as 'high traitors' in case of return."

It is clear that, with the execution of this law, the exertions of the police and of informers would have been superfluous, as the clergy were compelled to act as their own police and inform on themselves. The act, moreover, seems to have been prepared with a view to another bill, which was soon after pa.s.sed, for total expulsion. It was therefore nothing else than a preliminary measure devised to insure the success of this second act, and prevent the recurrence of the former "defect in the laws."

A new explanatory statute was accordingly drawn up, requiring the clergy to take the oath of abjuration before the 23d of March, 1710, under the penalties of transportation for life, and of high-treason if ever after found in the country. This bill, then, set them the alternative of abandoning either their country or their principles.

At the same time, for the encouragement of informers, the Commons resolved that "the prosecuting and informing against papists was an honorable service." Never before had a like declaration issued from any body in any nation, least of all by legislators, in favor of the confessedly meanest of all occupations; and it is doubtful if the most tyrannical of the Roman Caesars would ever have thought of mentioning the "honorable service" of the delatores whom they employed for the speedy destruction of those whose wealth they coveted. "Genus hominum," says Tacitus, "publico exitio repertum."

While on this subject, it has been remarked that most of the Irish informers ama.s.sed wealth by their bills of "discovery,"

whereas those of the days of Tiberius generally fell victims to their own artifices.

The eagerness for blood-money tracked the clergy to their loneliest retreats, and dragged them thence before persecuting tribunals, by whose sentence they were doomed to perpetual banishment. They must all have finally disappeared from the island, if the people, at last grown indignant at such baseness and cruelty, had not, by the loudness of their execrations, checked the activity of the priest-hunters. Wherever they dared show themselves, they were pelted with stones, and exposed to the summary vengeance of a maddened people.

The detestable "profession" became at last so infamous and unprofitable that foreign Jews were almost the only ones found willing to undertake this "honorable service;" and it is stated in the "Historia Dominicana," that one Garzia, a Portuguese Jew, was the most active of those human blood-hounds, and that, in 1718, he contrived to have seven of the proscribed clergy detected and apprehended.

We cannot speak of the most revolting measure ever intended to be taken against Catholic priests; namely mutilation, so long and with such energy denied by Protestants, who were themselves indignant at the mere mention of it, but now clearly proved by the archives of France, where doc.u.ments exist showing that the non-enactment of such an infamy was solely due to the severe words of remonstrance sent to England by the Duke of Orleans, regent of France during the minority of Louis XV.

As late as the middle of the century, in 1744, a sudden increase of rigor took place; intentions of conspiracy were ascribed to Catholics as usual, and without any motive whatever, unless it was caused by the sight of some religious houses, which had been quietly and un.o.btrusively reopened during the few years previous.

All at once the government issued a proclamation for "the suppression of monasteries, the apprehension of ecclesiastics, the punishment of magistrates remiss in the execution of the laws, and the encouragement of spies and informers by an increase of reward."

It was a repet.i.tion of the old story; a cruel persecution broke out in every part of the island. From the country priests fled to the metropolis, seeking to hide themselves amid the mult.i.tude of its citizens. Others fled to mountains and caverns, and the holy sacrifice was again offered up in lone places under the bare heavens, with sentinels to watch for the "prowling of the wolf," and no other outward dignity than that the grandeur of the forest and the rugged mountains gave.

In the cities the Catholics a.s.sisted at the celebration of the divine mysteries in stable-yards, garrets, and such obscure places as sheltered them from the pursuit of the magistrates. On one occasion, while the congregation (a.s.sembled in an old building) was kneeling to receive the benediction, the floor gave way, and all were buried beneath the ruin; many were killed, the priest among others; some were maimed for life, and remained to the end of their lives monuments of the cruelty of the government. The dead and dying, and the wounded, were carried through the streets on carts; and the sad spectacle at last moved the Protestants themselves to sympathy. The government was compelled to give way, and allow the persecuted Catholics to enjoy without further molestation the private exercise of their religion.

But that this was not a willing concession on the part of the reigning power is manifest enough from the steady, unswerving, contrary policy pursued until that time. It was simply forced to give way to outraged public opinion, then openly opposed throughout Europe to persecution for conscience' sake.

With religion education was also proscribed. Already, under William of Orange, had papist school-masters been forbidden to teach, but the penalty of their disobedience to the law did not go beyond a fine of a few pounds. So that the Irish youth could still, with some precautionary prudence, find teachers of the Greek and Latin languages, of mathematics, history, and geography. In Munster particularly schools and academies of literature flourished; the ardor of the people for the acquirement of knowledge could not be balked by such paltry obstacles as the laws of William III.

But the Irish Parliament under Anne could not rest satisfied with such mild measures. By the "Explanatory Act" of 1710, the school-master in Ireland was subjected to the same punishment as the priest whom he accompanied everywhere. Prison, transportation, death itself, became the reward of teaching. And in proportion as other laws, severer yet, prevented the people from sending their children abroad to be educated, and these laws were renewed occasionally and made more stringent and effective, the result was the total impossibility of Catholic children receiving any education higher than that of the house.

The final result is known to all. The "hedge-school" was established, that being the only way left of imparting elementary knowledge; and it required Irish ingenuity and Irish apt.i.tude for shifts to invent such a system, for system it was, and carry it through for so long a time.

But even the last sanctuary of home was yet to be sacrilegiously invaded; the most sacred of human rights could not be left to the persecuted people, and the strongest bonds of family affection were if possible to be broken asunder. What tyranny had never yet dared attempt in any age or country was to become a law in Ireland; and that holy feeling by which the members of a family are held together, in obedence to one of the most necessary and solemn commandments of G.o.d, could not be left undisturbed in the bosom of an Irish child. The father's rule over his children and the honor and love due by the child to its parent, were, in fact, declared by English legislation of no value, and fit subjects for cruel interference, introducing irresistible temptation.

Yes, by the laws enacted in the reign of Anne, the son was to be set against the father, and this for the sake of religion! It was a part of the Irish statutes, and for a long time it took occasional effect, that any son of a Catholic who should turn Protestant at any age, even the tenderest, should alone succeed to the family estate, which from the day of the son's conversion could neither be sold nor charged even with a debt of legacy.

From that same day the son was taken from his father's roof and delivered into the custody of some Protestant guardian. No tie, however sacred, no claim, however dear, was respected by those statesmen, who at the very time were the loudest to boast of their love for freedom, while trampling under foot the most indispensable rights of Nature.

The wickedest ingenuity of man could certainly not go beyond this to debase, degrade, and destroy a nation. After unprecedented calamities of former ages, we find millions of men reduced by other men, calling themselves Christians, to a condition of pagan helots, deprived of all rights and treated more barbarously than slaves. And all the while they were allowed, induced, encouraged to put an end to their misery by simply saying one word, taking one oath, "conforming " as the expression had it. Nevertheless they steadily refused to speak that word, to take that oath, to conform; that is to say, to abjure their religion. A few, weak in faith, or carried away by sudden pa.s.sion, a burst of despair, subscribe to the required oath, a.s.sist as demanded at the religious services on Sunday, suddenly rise to distinction, are sure of preserving their wealth, or even enter into sole possession of the family property, to the exclusion of all its other members. But such rare examples, instead of rousing the envy of the rest, excite only their contempt and execration. To them they are henceforth apostates, renegades to their faith, cast out from the bosom of the nation; and their countrymen hug their misery rather than exchange it for honors and wealth purchased by broken honor, lost faith, and cowardly desertion of the cause for which their country was what it was.

While the cowards were so few, and the brave men so many, the latter const.i.tuting indeed the whole bulk of the people, they were knit together as a band of brethren, never to be estranged from each other. If any thing is calculated to form a nation, to give it strength, to render it indestructible, imperishable, it is undoubtedly the ordeal through which they pa.s.sed without shrinking, and out of which they came with one mind, one purpose, animated by one holy feeling, the love of their religion, and the determination to keep it at all hazard.

Yes, at any moment throughout this long century, they might have changed their condition and come out at once to the enjoyment of all the rights dear to men, by what means is best expressed in the few words of Edmund Burke:

"Let three millions of people" (the number of Irishmen at the time he spoke) "but abandon all that they and their ancestors have been taught to believe sacred, and forswear it publicly in terms most degrading, scurrilous, and indecent, for men of integrity and virtue, and abuse the whole of their former lives, and slander the education they have received, and nothing more is required of them. There is no system of folly, or impiety, or blasphemy, or atheism, into which they may not throw themselves, and which they may not profess openly and as a system, consistently with the enjoyment of all the privileges of a free citizen in the happiest const.i.tution in the world."

Thus does the reason of man commend their constancy; but that constancy required something more than human strength. G.o.d it was who supported them. He alone could grant power of will strong enough to uphold men plunged for so long a time in such an abyss of wretchedness. To him could they cry out with truth: "It is only owing to Divine mercy that we have not perished;"

misericordias Domini, quod non sumus consumpti!

But human reason can better comprehend the effect produced on a vast mult.i.tude of people by oppression so unexampled in its severity. An immense development of manhood and self-dependence, an heroic determination to bear every trial for conscience' sake, and a certainty of succeeding, in the long-run, in breaking the heavy chain and casting off the intolerable yoke --such was the effect.

It has been a.s.serted by some authors, who have written on that terrible eighteenth century in Ireland, that the spirit of the people was entirely broken, that there was no energy left among them, and that the imposition of burdens heavier still, were such a thing possible, could scarcely elicit from them even the semblance of remonstrance. It was only natural to think so; but, in our opinion, this is only true of the external despondency under which the people was bowed, but utterly false with respect to a lack of mental energy.

There certainly was no general attempt at insurrection on their part; nor did they take refuge in that last resource of despair-- death after a vain vengeance. If the writers referred to would have preferred this last fatal resource of wounded pride, they are right in their estimate of the Irish; but they forget that the victims were Christians, and could lend no ear to a vengeance which is futile and a despair which is forbidden.

There was a better course open before them, and they followed it: to resign themselves to the will of a G.o.d they believed in and for whom they suffered, and wait patiently for the day of deliverance. It was sure to come; and if those then living were doomed not to see that happy day, they knew that they would leave it as an inheritance to their children.

Those writers would doubtless have been satisfied of the existence of a will among the people, and their conduct would have met with greater approval, had the attempts of some individuals at private revenge been more general and successful; if the bands of Rapparees, White Boys, and others, had wrought more evil upon their oppressors, although they could not prepare them to renew the struggle on a large scale with better prospect of success.

But this could not be; success could never have been reached by such a road, and it was useless to attempt it. At that time, there existed no possibility of the Irish recovering their rights by force. Meanwhile Providence was not forgetful of those who were fighting the braver moral battle of suffering and endurance for their religion. It was preparing the nation for a future life of great purposes, by purifying it in the crucible of affliction, and preserving the people pure and undebased.

Nowhere has the period of calamity been so protracted and so severe. Ireland stands alone in a history of wretchedness of seven centuries' duration. She stands alone, particularly inasmuch as, with her, the affliction has gone on continually increasing until quite recently, unrefreshed by periods of relief and glimpses of bright hope. The sinking spirits of the people, it is true, have been buoyed up from time to time by sanguine expectations; but only to find their expectations crowned with bitter disappointment and sink deeper again in the sea of their afflictions.

Nevertheless, through all that time the Irish continued morally strong, and ready at the right moment to leap into the stature of giants in strength and resolution. How they did so will be seen, and the simplicity of the explanation will be matter for surprise. But it is fitting first to set in the strongest light the a.s.sertion that the Irish were really debased by the calamities of that age, that they possessed no self-dependence at a time when that was the only thing left to them.

This view is thus expressed in G.o.dkin's "History of Ireland:"

"Too well did the penal code accomplish its dreadful work of debas.e.m.e.nt on the intellects, morals, and physical condition of a people sinking in degeneracy from age to age, till all manly spirit, all virtuous sense of personal independence and responsibility was nearly extinct, and the very features--vacant, timid, cunning, and unreflective--betrayed the crouching slave within."

And the writer, a well-disposed Protestant, did not see how it could well be otherwise, and took it for granted that every one would admit the truth of his a.s.sertions without the slightest hesitation.

For he adds, a little farther on: "Having no rights of franchise- -no legal protection of life or property--disqualified to handle a gun, even as a common soldier or a game-keeper-- forbidden to acquire the elements of knowledge at home or abroad--forbidden even to render to G.o.d what conscience dictated as his due--what could the Irish be but abject serfs? What nature in their circ.u.mstances could have been otherwise? Is it not amazing that any social virtue could have survived such an ordeal--that any seeds of good, any roots of national greatness could have outlived such a long tempestuous winter? "

Still Mr. G.o.dkin was mistaken; the Irish had suffered no "debas.e.m.e.nt of the intellects, of the morals, not even of the physical condition," notwithstanding the plenitude of causes existing to bring such results about.

Their intellect had been kept in ignorance. Unable to procure instruction for their children, except by stealth and in opposition to the laws, few of them could acquire even the first elements of mental culture. But the intellect of a nation is not necessarily debased on that account. As a general rule, it is true that ignorance begets mental darkness and error, and will often debase the mind and sink the intellectual faculties to the lowest human level. But this happens only to people who, having no religious substratum to rest upon, are left at the mercy of error and delusions. One great thought, at least, was ever present to their minds, and that thought was in itself sufficient to preserve their intellect from being degraded; it was this "Man is n.o.bler than the brute and born to a higher destiny." This truth was deeply engraved in their minds; and in defence of it they battled, and fought, and bled, all down the painful course of their history.

Had the intellect of the nation been really debased, would not their religious principles have been the first things to be thrown overboard? Would they not have adopted unhesitatingly all the tenets successively proposed to them by the various "reformers" of England? What is truth, when there is no mind to receive it? It requires a strong mind indeed to say, "I will suffer every thing, death itself, rather thin repudiate what I know comes from G.o.d." It is useless to dwell longer on these considerations. The man who sees not in such an heroic determination proof of a strong and n.o.ble mind may be possessed of a great, but to common-sense people it will look like a very limited intelligence.