Judicature in such a method as tended to destroy the Protestant English Interest of Ireland 1. THE support and happiness of a Kingdom consists chiefly in the equal and impartial Administration of Justice and that depends on the choice of fit and duly qualified Persons for filling the Courts and Executing the Laws but King James made choice of such Persons for these Offices as were so far from answering the intent of their Places that they made it their business to destroy the Protestant Interest and the Laws that preserve the Liberty of the Subject in general by those Laws no Man was capable of being a Judg who had not taken the Oath of Supremacy The Judges he found on the Bench had taken it but yet some of them were known to be rather too favourable to Papists and considering the influence King James had in his Brothers time in disposing of Offices it is not to be imagined that he would suffer any Man to sit as a Judge who had not been favourably represented unto him in that Point though we must own he was mistaken in some of them hence it came that Protestants did frequently complain of the Favour and Countenance their Adversaries found in the Courts of Justice even in King Charles II. time But when King James came to the Crown moderate nay favourable Judges would not do the Work he designed He found it necessary to Employ the most Zealous of his Party those who both by Interest and Inclination were most deeply ingaged to destroy the Protestant English Interest and accordingly such were picked out and set on all the Benches 2. The Chancery is the great and highest Court wherein the great Frauds and other matters belonging to Trusts and Equity are determined and neither the Lord Primate Boyle who had managed that Court about twenty years nor Sir Charles Porter who succeeded him could answer the Kings intention but Sir Alexander Fitton of whom I have already given some account a Person detected of Forgery not only at Westminster and Chester but likewise Fined by the House of Lords in Parliament must be brought out of Goal and set on the highest Court of the Kingdom to keep the Kings Conscience though he wanted Law and natural Capacity as well as Honesty and Courage to discharge such a Trust and had no other quality to recommend him besides his being a Convert Papist that is a Renegado to his Religion and his Country but the mystery of this was easily found out The Papists of Ireland had gone a great way to retrieve the Estates they had forfeited by the Rebellion 1641 by counterfeit Settlements Forgeries and Perjuries and to do their business in a great measure there needed no more than to find a Judg that would be favourable to and countenance such proceedings and where could they find a more favourable Judg than one who was notoriously involved in the same guilt and who probably in some Cases did not esteem such Arts unlawful but besides this there is requisite to a Chancellor a peculiar quickness of Parts and Dexterity to penetrate into the contrivances of Cheats and Forgeries for which Sir Alexander Fittons natural slowness and heaviness incapacitated him but this very defect together with his Zeal for Popery fitted him to execute the Kings design as effectually as any that could have been found He could not understand the merit of a Cause of any difficulty and therefore never failed to give Sentence according to his inclination having no other Rule to lead him and how he was inclined towards Protestants appeared from his Declarations on all occations against them he did not stick on a Hearing to declare that they were all Rogues and that amongst forty thousand there was not one who was not a Traitor a Rebel and a Villain for this Reason he would not allow the Guardianship of a Child to the Protestant Mother but gave it against the positive words of the Law to the Popish Relations for this Reason he refused to hear so much as a demurrer in the Popish Dean of Christs Church Mr. Staffords Case For this Cause he over-ruled both the common Rules of Practice of the Courts and the Laws of the Land declaring in open Court that the Chancery was above all Laws that no Law could bound his Conscience and he acted accordingly in many Cases where Protestants were concerned After hearing a Cause between one of them and a Papist he would often declare that he would consult a Divine before he gave a Decree that is he would have the Opinion of a Popish Priest his Chaplain Educated in Spain and furnished with Destinctions to satisfie his Conscience how far he should do Justice to Protestants many Papists came and made Affidavits of being in Possession when they never were and got Injunctions and Orders without any more ado to quiet their Possessions But a Protestant though never so palpably disturbed could not procure any Order but was sent to the Common-Law to recover his Possession by a Popish Jury returned by a Popish Sheriff before a Popish Judg that is he must expect Law from Judges and Officers that Sate and Acted in defiance of Law If at any time the Chancellor was forced to grant an Injunction or Decree it was with all the difficulties and delays that could be and often the thing was lost and destroyed before the Order came for recovering it 3. The Administration of Justice and Equity is the great end of Government and it is as good nay better to be without Governours than to have Governors under whom Men cannot reasonably hope for these We see from the choice of a Chancellor what care King Iames took for the Administration of Equity to Protestants To help the matter he added as Assistants to the Chancellor Mr. Stafford a Popish Priest for one Master of the Chancery and Felix ô Neal Son of Turlogh ô Neal the great Rebel in 1641 and Massacrer of the Protestants for another To these generally the Causes between Protestants and Papists were referred and upon their Report the Chancellor past his Orders and Decrees 4. The Courts of Common-Law were put into the same method and great care taken to fill them with Judges who might be ingaged in a profest enmity to the Protestant Interest In Ireland there are only three Judges on a Bench and it was thought fit for a colour till things were Riper to keep one Protestant on every Bench but whilst there were two Votes to one the Protestant Judg could neither do Right to Protestants or retard a Sentence to be given in the favour of a Papist This mock method of seeming to trust Protestants they took likewise in naming Burgesses and Aldermen for Corporations they generally put some few into their New Charters to serve for a pretence of impartiallity and yet to signifie nothing this Method of continuing some few Protestants in Courts and Corporations serving only to silence and exasperate us to be thus
imposed on but contributed nothing to relieve us as we found to our Costs and the Protestant Judges and Burgesses finding that they were made Cyphers and Properties of themselves declined at last to Act in their Stations 5. Next to Chancery is the Kings Bench where Subjects are tryed for their Lives and Fortunes upon this was set Mr. Thomas Nugent made afterwards Baron of Riverstown the Son of one who had been Earl of Westmeath but had lost his Honor and Estate for being an Actor in the late Rebellion begun in 1641. This Mr. Nugent who had never been taken notice of at the Bar but for a more than ordinary Brogue on his Tongue as they call it and ignorance in the Law was pitched on by King James to judg whether the Outlawries against his Father and his fellow Rebels should be reversed and whether the Settlement of Ireland founded on those Outlawries should stand good It was a Demonstration to us what the King intended when he assigned us such a Chief Justice and indeed the Gentleman did not fail to answer the expectation conceived of him He reversed the Outlawries as fast as they came before him notwithstanding a Statute made in point against it and in all the Causes that ever came before him wherein the Plaintiffs and Defendants were Papist and Protestant I could not learn from the most diligent Observer that ever he gave Sentence for the latter Nay it is Shrewdly suspected that he went sharer in some considerable Causes and not only appeared for them on the Bench but also secretly incouraged and fomented them Before him a Deed should be judged Forged or not Forged according as it served a Popish Interest And a Protestant needed no more to gain a Cause against another Protestant than to turn Papist which manifestly appear'd in Sir Gregory Birns Case who merely by turning Papist as is noted before in the midst of his Suit against Captain Robert Fitz Gerald got a Deed condemned of Forgery and recovered five or six hundred pounds per annum notwithstanding Mr. Daniel Birn his Father some years before for pretending it was Forged had been Sued in an Action of the Case and forced to pay two hundred pound damages and though there appeared in Court a Bond under Birns Hand obliging him to pay two hundred pound to the Witnesses in case they should prove Captain Fitz Geralds Deed to be Forged yet the proof was accepted But these were common things in this Court and the mischief had been much greater had not a Writ of Error lyen from his Court to the Kings Bench in England In one thing more he signalized himself it was by committing and prosecuting people for feigned Offences and Treasons and by countenancing and encouraging and after discovery protecting false Witnesses against Protestants Many were brought in danger of their Lives by his contrivances and when the accused were acquitted on Tryal by a palpable Demonstration that the Witnesses were Perjured he declared that they neither could nor should be Prosecuted for they only sware for the King and he believed the accused persons guilty though it could not be proved In short he shewed all the venom and rigour against them he could he was set up to destroy them and he went as far in it as his power could reach his weakness not his inclination hindred him from carrying it farther It is not imaginable by any that have not seen and heard him how furiously and partially he was bent against Protestants it may be guessed how he stood inclined to them by the great Hand he had in promoting the Bill of Attainder and the Bill to vest all Absentees Goods in the King whereby much the greater part of the Protestants of Ireland lost all their Estates Personal and Real of which we shall speak more hereafter He was assisted on the Bench by Sir Bryan ô Neal as puny Judg a weak Man that had nothing to recommend him but Venom and Zeal being otherwise disabled both in his Reason and Body Only he had the faculty to do what he was bid especially when it suited with his own inveteracy against Englishmen and Protestants This Character may seem rigid but as many as knew him will not think it exceeds 6. The next Court for business though not for Precedence is the Exchequer in which all Actions wherein the Kings Revenue or any other Mans Estate is concerned may be tryed From this Court no Writ of Error lies in England so they were free here from that Check which was so troublesom to them in other Courts Upon this consideration it was that the whole business of the Kingdom so far as it concerned them was brought into this Court though not so proper for it Here were brought all Actions of Trespasses and Ejectments concerning Estates all Quo Warranto's against Corporations and Scire Facias's about Offices and they thought themselves concerned to have an able Man and one throughly Cordial to their Interest for the Chief Judg in it for if he had wanted Sense or Law though willing as they found by Experience in some of the other Courts he might have been unable to serve them in all Cases They therefore fixed on Mr. Stephen Rice afterward Sir Stephen who had formerly been noted for a Rook and Gamester at the Inns of Court He was to give him his due a Man of the best Sense amongst them well enough versed in the Law but most signal for his inveteracy against the Protestant Interest and Settlement of Ireland having been often heard to say before he was a Judg that he would drive a Coach and Six Horses through the Act of Settlement upon which both depended And before that Act was Repealed in their pretended Parliament he declared on the Bench that it was against Natural Equity and could not oblige This Man did King James choose for Chief Baron and for the final determination of all the Suits that lay between Protestants and Papists either in common-Common-Law or Equity And it is no hard matter to conjecture what success the Protestants met with in their Suits before a Judg that declared as he did that they should have no favour but Summum jus that is the utmost rigour of the Law Immediately his Court was filled with Popish Plaintiffs every one that had a forged Deed or a false Witness met with Favour and Countenance from him and he knowing that they could not bring his Sentences into England to be re-examined there acted as a Man that feared no after Account or Reckoning It was some considerable time before he would allow a Writ of Error into the Exchequer Chamber though that was in effect to themselves and when it was allowed it was to little purpose before such Judges It was before him all the Charters of the Kingdom were damned and that in a Term or two in such a manner that proved him a Man of Dispatch though not of Justice If he had been left alone it was
the common Offices of Humanity This Chancellor Fitton declared on the Bench This the King's Favourites and Attendants suggested publickly to him at his times of Eating at his Couchee and Levee and upon all occasions However it was it is evident by the effect that King James in great measure completed the Ruin of the Protestants and English Interest in this Kingdom which will plainly appear 1. In his dealing with the Army 2. With the Courts of Judicature 3. With the Privy Council and Offices 4. With Corporations 5. With Trade and the trading People of the Nation 6. With our Liberties 7. With our Fortunes 8. With the Lives of his Protestant Subjects And 9. With their Religion SECT II. I. King James's Dealing with the Army of Ireland in order to destroy the Protestants and English Interest 1. THE Army of Ireland which King James found at his coming to the Crown consisted of about seven thousand as Loyal Men and as Cordial to the King's Service as any could be both Officers and Soldiers had been inured to it for many years They looked on him as their Master and Father intirely depending on him and expecting nothing from any Body else When Monmouth's and Argile's Rebellion called for their assistance to suppress them no People in the World could shew more Chearfulness or Forwardness than they did and it is observable that no one Man in Ireland was ever found to be conscious or consenting to those Rebellions the Protestants of all sorts shewed great Horror and Detestation of them and were discernably melancholy till the Rebels were suppressed Most of the Officers of this Army had been so zealous to serve the King that they had by his permission and encouragement bought their Employments many of them had laid out their whole Fortunes and contracted Debts to purchase a Command yet no sooner was King James settled in his Throne but he began to turn out some of the Officers that had been most zealous for his Service and had deserved best of him merely because they had been counted firm to the Protestant Religion and English Interest The first who were made Examples to the rest were the Lord Shannon Captain Robert Fitz-Gerald Captain Richard Coote and Sir Oliver S. George The three first were Earls Sons who either in their own persons or by their Fathers and Relations had been signally active in restoring King Charles the Second and the Royal Family to their just Rights 1660 so had Sir Oliver S. George and they were all of them without any other Exception but their Zeal for their Religion and the English Interest in Ireland But the common Saying was that King James would regard no Man for any Service done to him his Father or Brother but only for future Service that he expected from them and since he could fot expect that these Gentlemen should assist him to destroy the Protestant Religion or the Liberties of his Subjects which was the Service he then expected he took their Troops from them and gave them to persons of mean or broken Fortunes who must do any thing to keep them some of them unqualified by Law It is fit their Names should be known that the Reader may the better observe what kind of Change the King began with when he substituted Captain Kerney if I remember right one of the Ruffians Captain Anderson a person of no Fortune Captain Sheldon a professed Papist and Captain Graham in the places of the Lord Shannon Captain Fitz-Gerald Captain Coote and Sir Oliver S. George 2. But to convince the World that no Consideration was to be had of Loyalty or Merit except a Man were a Papist The Duke of Ormond was sent for abruptly and devested of the Government with such Circumstances that did no ways correspond with the Service he had rendered the Crown in general and King James in particular Immediately the modelling of the Army was put into the Hands of Collonel Richard Talbott a person more hated than any other Man by the Protestants and who had been named by Oates in his Narrative for this very Employment When therefore the Protestants saw him put into it many who believed nothing of a Plot before gave credit now to his Narrative and the common Saying was that if Oates was an ill Evidence he was certainly a good Prophet Collonel Talbott afterwards Earl of Tyrconnell knew the Necessity of having the Army fitted to his purpose it being the Engine he depended on for destroying the Religion Liberty and Laws of the Kingdom and therefore set about it with all expedition and prosecuted it in such a manner as might be expected from a Man of his insolent temper He exercised at the same time so much Falshood and Barbarity that if the Army had not been the best principled with Loyalty and Obedience of any in the World they would have 〈◊〉 or at least dispatched him In the Morning he would take an Officer into his Closet and with all the Oaths Curses and Damnations that were never wanting to him he would profess Friendship and Kindness to him and promise him the continuance of his Commission and yet in the Afternoon cashier him with all the contempt he could heap on him nay perhaps while he was thus caressing him he had actually given away his Commission The Officers of Ireland then cashiered and their Acquaintance can vouch the truth of this in many instances As for the Soldiers and Troopers his way with them was to march them from their usual Quarters to some distant place where he thought they were least known where they would be put to greatest Hardships and there he stripped them the Foot of their Cloaths for which they had payed and the Troopers of their Horses Boots and Furniture bought with their own Money and set them to walk barefooted one hundred or one hundred and fifty Miles to their Homes or Friends if they had any Sometimes he would promise them something for their Horses but then he told them that they must come to Dublin for it if any came to demand the small pittance promised them for their Horses or Arrears of Pay he contrived it so that they should be obliged to wait till they had spent twice as much as they expected and most of them after all got nothing By this means two or three hundred Protestant Gentlemen who had laid out all or a good part of their Fortunes and contracted Debts on Commissions were not left worth any thing but were turned out without reason or any consideration and sive or six thousand Soldiers sent a begging a hardship perhaps never put on any Army before without any provocation against whom there was no other Exception but that they were English Men and Protestants and King James by substituting Irish Men and Papists in their places contrary to the Laws and to the very Design of keeping a standing Army in Ireland clearly demonstrated that he had no regard to the Laws or to the
did not look on themselves to have resisted any persons legally commissioned by the King nor was there any need of a Judge or Judgment in the Case the Question being no other than Whether the Law required that our Governors and Army should not be Papists And whether the Earl of Tirconnell and those he employed were Papists Both which were notorious and confessed by all without the Determination of a Court or Judges 17. As to the point of Necessity 't is as plain there was no Necessity on King James to employ these persons whom the Law had disabled to serve him Protestants were numerous enough and willing enough to serve him in every thing that was for the Interest of the Kingdom but he not only refused to entertain them but turned out such as he found employed without the least Crime or Accusation and put in their places persons not only unqualified by Law for the Employments into which he put them but also unfit and uncapable to discharge them which sufficiently shewed that it was Choice not Necessity made him employ them But he foresaw that such persons as the Laws designed for Employments would not assist to destroy the Laws Liberties and Religion of the Kingdom and therefore he exchanged them for those new Servants whose Interest it was to join with him in his ill Designs and whose Service was their Crime who deserved the most severe punishments not only for accepting these Employments against the Laws but likewise using them to the Subversion of all Law and Justice If therefore there was any necessity on King James to employ such Servants it was a criminal Necessity and intirely of his own making and if he imagined that such a Necessity would excuse him from his Coronation Oath of governing according to the Laws and justifie his dispensing with all the Laws made for the Security of his Subjects why should he not allow the same Liberty to his Subjects and think that an inevitable Necessity of avoiding Ruin should be a sufficient Reason for them to dispense with their Obedience to him notwithstanding their Oaths of Allegiance especially where the Necessity is not pretended or created by themselves as his was but apparent and forced on them by him According therefore to his own Rules he cannot blame them for refusing to obey him where no Law required their Obedience or for resisting him in those unlawful Methods they saw him engaged in to their manifest Destruction But King James was resolved to venture all and as many of his Favourites expressed it would not be a Slave to the Laws and therefore endeavoured to be their Master In England he granted without any apparent Necessity nay against not only the Interest and Safety of the Kingdom but even to his own prejudice several Dispensations but these passed in some colour or form of Law and many of them at least passed the Offices and Seals but in Ireland they did not trouble themselves with these Formalities A verbal Command from the King was a sufficient Dispensation to all Laws made in favour of a Protestant the Officers acted and the Courts judged as if there had been no such Laws in being Here the Dispensations went much higher than in England even to dispensing with the Laws against robbing and taking away property for if King James had a mind to any thing he sent an Officer with a File of Musquetiers and fetched it away without considering the Owners and to shew us that his Commands were not merely pretended by these Officers which I confess often happened when they did such illegal things the King himself to shew I say that it was his determinate Resolution to act us did sometimes send Orders under his Hand to take away many things of great value without offering any Retribution or Satisfaction to the Owners Many Instauces of this kind may be given I shall only mention one because it made some noise A Grant in nature of a Lease with a reserv'd Rent to the Crown was made by King Charles the Second to some of his Courtiers as a Gratuity for considerable Services whereby the sole Liberty to coin Copper-Money in the Kingdom of Ireland for one and twenty years was given to them This Grant was purschased at a dear rate from the Grantees by Sir John Knox late Lord Mayor of Dublin and was renewed not without great Trouble and Charges to him by King James after his Accession to the Crown When he came into Ireland he found this Grant in the Hands of Collonel Roger Moor to whom it came by way of Legacy from the Purchaser King James designing to set up a Brass Mint sent for this Grant and had it strictly canvast to see if any Flaw could be found in it none could be found nor would the Collonel be persuaded to give it up The King therefore commanded it to be laid aside and his own Mint to be proceeded on without regard to it But having occasion for the coining Tools and Engines belonging to this without consulting the Owner or enquiring whether he was willing to part with them he sent and seised on them violently forcing open the Doors and taking away to a considerable Value Collonel Moore petitioned for Redress or at least some Consideration for his Loss but his Petition was rejected without being heard Such proceedings were common and shews us plainly what a weak Barrier Laws are against a person who designs absolute Power and who believes according to our late Act of Recognition That the Decision in all Cases of a misused Authority by a Lawful Hereditary King must be left to the sole Judgment of God SECT IV. III. King James's Progress to destroy his Protestant Subjects by his disposing of Civil Offices and ordering the Privy Council 1. I Have already taken notice how King James disposed the Military Offices in such a Method as must unavoidably ruin the Protestant Interest in Ireland it was not altogether so easie to out Men of their Civil Employment as of their Military 1. Because many had Patents for Life or Good Behaviour And 2. Because some of the Offices themselves were so difficult to be managed that it was not easie to find Roman Catholicks capable of discharging them yet it appeared necessary in order to ruin the Protestants that they should be turned out of them and therefore King James and his Ministers resolved to do it as fast as they could As soon as they could find a Papist that would or durst undertake them they put him in and they plainly declared that no Protestant after a little while should have any Office of Trust or Profit left in his Hands Some Offices they disposed of without more ado by new Patents and put the Patentee in Possession without taking notice that there was another Patent in being leaving the former Proprietor to bring his Action at Law if he pleased Thus they served Sir Charles Meredith for his Chancellorship of the Exchequer and thus they
did worse that is betrayed it by their Compliance whilst yet they profest it Many who would not be guilty of such servility were turned out even from the mean Employments of a High or Petty Constable of a Goalour or Turn-Key of all which it were easie to give Examples but the thing being Universal makes that unnecessary Even these mean Employments were now counted too good for Protestants and all this contrary to the express Letter of the Law which admitted none but such as would take the Oath of Supremacy to any Office but they took a peculiar Pleasure to act in contempt and despite of the Laws and it seemed to them a kind of Conquest to turn a Man out of his Employment Office or Freehold contrary to Law In the mean time it was a melancholy thing for Protestants to live under such illegal Officers and have their Lives Estates and Liberties at the mercy of Sheriffs Justices and Juries some of whose Fathers or nearest Relations they had either hanged for Thieving Robbery and Murthering or killed in the very Act of Torying 5. I reckon as a fourth sort of Officers in the Kingdom such as were of the Privy-Council which in Ireland is a great part of the Constitution and has considerable Privileges and Power annexed to it Regularly no Act of Parliament can pass in Ireland till the chief Governor and Privy-Council do first certifie the Causes and Reasons of it It was therefore no less than necessary that King James should model this to his mind and he quickly ordered it so that the Papists made the majority in it and whereas before it was a Refuge and Sanctuary to the oppressed it now became a most effectual Instrument to strengthen the Popish Interest and give Reputation to their Proceedings We may guess what kind of Government King James designed when he was attended with such a Council and yet it is certain even some of these who were Protestants would have been turned out if they had not absented themselves and declined appearing at the Board but whether they appeared or no was of no consideration since it is plain they could do Protestants little service SECT V. Fourthly King James's ordering Corporations was an effectual means to destroy his Protestant Subjects and to alter the very Nature of the Government 1. WOever knows the Constitution of England and Ireland must observe that the Subjects have no other security for their Liberties Properties and Lives except the Interest they have of choosing their own Representatives in Parliament This is the only Barrier they have against the Encroachments of their Governor Take it away and they are as absolute Slaves to the Kings Will and as miserable as the Peasants in France Whoever therefore goes about to deprive them of this Right utterly destroys the very Constitution and Foundation of the Government Now the Protestants of Ireland finding the necessity of securing this right in their own Hands to preserve the Kingdom in Prosperity and Peace had procured many Corporations to be Founded and built many considerable Corporate Towns at their own Cost and Charges They thought it reasonable to keep these in their own Hands as being the Foundation of the Legislative power and therefore secluded Papists as Enemies to the English Interest in Ireland from Freedom and Votes in them by the very Foundation and Rules of planting them This Caution they extended by a Law to all other Corporations in the Kingdom excluding Papists likewise from them which they justly did if we remember that these Papists had forfeited their Right in them by their Rebellion in 1641 and by their having turned those Towns where they had Interest into Nests of Traitors against the King and into places of Refuge for the Murtherers of the English insomuch that it cost England some Millions to reduce them again into Obedience witness Killkenny Waterford Galway Lymerick and every other place where they had power to do it Add to this that generally the trading industrious Men of the Kingdom were Protestants who had built most of the Corporate Towns above thirty at once in King James the First 's time and a great part of the Freeholds of the Kingdom did also belong to Men of the same Religion insomuch that if a fair Election had been allowed in probability no Papist could have carryed it in any one County of Ireland All which considered it was but reasonable that the Protestants that had by so much Blood and Treasure brought the Kingdom into subjection to the Laws of England and planted it in such a manner as to render it worth the Governing by the King should be secured of their Representatives in Parliament especially when out of their great Loyalty and Confidence in the Kings kind intention to them they by some new Rules had condescended that none should Officiate as Majors Portrieves Magistrates or Sheriffs in the chief Towns till approved by the Kings chief Governor for the time being Their yielding this to the King was a sufficient security one would have thought to the Royal Interest A great diminution of their Liberties and such as never was yielded before to any King but this would not serve King James to be Absolute he must have the intire Disposition of them and the Power to put in and turn out whom he pleased without troubling the Formalities of Law To bring them therefore to this it was resolved to Dissolve them all Tyrconnel knew that the Protestants would never give up their Charters without being compelled by Law and therefore he endeavoured to prevail with them to admit Papists to Freedom and Offices in them that by their means he might have them surrendred but the Resolution of Sir John Knox then Lord Mayor of Dublin and of the then Table of Aldermen spoiled that Design and forced the King to bring Quo Warranto's against them since they would not easily consent to destroy themselves 2. The Chief Baron Rice and the Attorney General Nagle were employed as the fittest Instruments to carry on this Work To prevent Writs of Error into England all these Quo Warranto's were brought in the Exchequer and in about two Terms Judgments were entred against most Charters Whereas if either Equity or Law had been regarded longer time ought to have been allowed in matters of such Consequence for the Defendants to draw up their Plea than the Chief Baron took to dispatch the whole Cause and seize their Franchises Attorney General Nagle plaid all the little Tricks that could be thought of and had an ordinary Attorney brought such Demurrers or Pleadings into Court in a common Cause as he did in this most weighty Affair of the Kingdom he would have received a publick Rebuke and been struck out of the Roll for his Knavery or ignorance After all there was not one Corporation found to have Forfeited by a Legal Tryal neither was any Crime or Cause of forfeiture objected against them yet the Chief Baron gave Judgment against
not believe him till he shewed the Copy which much surpriz'd Sir Richard he began to enquire how his Lordship came by it and intimated that the Keepers of the Rolls were Treacherous in letting any one see it much more in letting a Copy of it go abroad His Lordship with good reason express'd his Admiration that an Act of Parliament should be made a Secret and the Laws upon the Observation of which the Lives and Fortunes of so many Men depended should be conceal'd with so much care from them At last the Attorny told him That he himself would draw up a Warrant for Sir Thomas Southwell's Pardon that should do his Business and get the King to Sign it But the Earl refused to accept his offer unless his Lawyer might first peruse it which being granted the Lawyer upon perusal found it to be such as would not hold in Law and intended only to delude him The Earl made new Application to King James and Sir Richard being sent for the King ask'd him why he did not prepare a Fiant for Sir Thomas Southwell's Pardon according to the Warrant sent to him He answered That his Majesty could not grant such a Pardon That his Majesty was only a Trustee for Forfeited Estates and could not Dispense with the Act that by an express Clause in it all Pardons that should be granted were declar'd void The King in some Passion told him That he hoped they did not intend to retrench his Prerogative Sir Richard replied That his Majesty had read the Act before he pass'd it The King answered He had betray'd him that he depended on him for drawing the Act and if he had drawn it so that there was no room for Dispensing and Pardoning he had been false to him or words to that effect Thus the Matter ended and Sir Thomas went into Scotland with my Lord Seaforth without being able to obtain his Pardon for Estate or Life the Act voiding any Pardon granted to any attainted by it after Nov. 1. 1689. or not enrolled before the last day of that Month. 18. And now I doubt not but the Reader from this Story which is literally true will observe first the Juggling of the Popish Lawyers with King James and will pity a Prince who gave himself up to such False and Double-dealing Counsellors when an Act of Parliament is made against a Papist then it is no less than Treason to question the King 's Pardoning and Dispensing Power but when an Act bears hard on a Protestant and the King has a mind to ease him then the King has no power to Dispense he cannot grant a Pardon tho he earnestly desire it From whence we may see that the Dispensing Power was only set up to shelter Papists from the Law and ruin Protestants and that Papists in their Hearts are as much against it as Protestants 2. We may observe what fair Justice was design'd for Protestants a Law was made to turn near 3000 out of their Estates and to take away their Lives if they did not come in against a certain day and yet the Law that subjected them to this Penalty was made a Secret and they not suffer'd to know one word of it till the time allow'd them to come in was past at least three Months but there was an Intrigue in this they knew they had a Party in England who were to face down the World that there were no such Acts made a Party that were to represent it as a Sham and Contrivance of King James's Enemies to make him Odious and the great Argument they were to urge to prove it must be to alledge Where is the Act Why doth it not appear If there were any such Act would not the People that came so often from Ireland and tell such Frightful Stories have brought it with them This is the part the Favourers of King James were to act in England and Scotland and this is the reason the Act was so long kept Secret 3. We may observe the Folly of those Men who were attainted in this Act themselves and yet Flatter themselves with the hopes of living Happily and enjoying their Estates nay and getting Preferment under K. James when restor'd to his Kingdoms these Men do not consider that this Act would be restor'd together with him and that then it is not in his power to do this for them that if they expect any such thing they must be oblig'd to an Irish Popish Parliament for it and he is much a Stranger to Ireland that knows not what Mercy an English-man and a Protestant is to exspect from them especially when they can give him nothing but what is taken from one of themselves Till therefore the Papists of Ireland become so good natur'd as to give away by their own voluntary act their Estates of which they were in actual Possession to Protestants it is the greatest Folly in the World for any Protestant to think of enjoying any Estate in Ireland 4. For 't is observable that the Protestants Estates were not only given away by this Act of Attainder but the Papists were likewise in Possession of them by the following means The Act of Repeal was to be executed by Commissioners appointed by the King who were to determine the Claims of the Proprietors or Heirs to the Proprietors of the respective Estates October 22. 1641. and give Injunctions to the Sheriff to put them in Possession In the mean time the Protestants were to keep their Possessions till the First of May 1690. and to pay Rent to the Popish Proprietors The same Commissioners were to set out Reprizals to reprizable Persons But notwithstanding this no such Commissioners ever sate the Protestants were generally outed and the Papists possess'd both of their old Estates and likewise of the Estates of Protestants they compass'd this by several Stratagems 19. Wherever the Protestants had set their Lands to Papist Tenants those Tenants forsook their Protestant Landlords and became Tenants to the pretended Popish Proprietors Several Protestants complained in Chancery of this as contrary to the Act which allowed them to keep Possession till May 1690. which not being yet come nor any Commissioners being yet appointed to execute the Act they mov'd for an Injunction to quite their Possessions but the Chancellor answer'd That this did not concern Landlords that set their Lands but only such as occupied Farms themselves and that the Parliament had granted that indulgence to them only that they might have time to dispose of their Stocks which not being their Case who had Tenants they must go to Common Law and try their Titles by this means most of the old Popish Proprietors got into their Estates Nay they not only outed the Landlords of their Estates but even the Protestant Tenants of their Leases made in consideration of a valuable reserv'd Rent though this was positively against the intent of the Act which confirm'd such Leases and only gave the reserved Rent to the restor'd Proprietor 2.
this but rather than depend on the Faith of King James or his Party chose to suffer the utmost Extremity The Breach of Articles by my Lord Galmoy to Mr. Dixey a Young Gentleman Son to the Dean of Kilmore and Mr. Charlton was yet more barbarous the Lord Galmoy went down in March 168 to the County of Cavan and surpriz'd these two Gentlemen he had a Party of the Army with him and took up his Quarters at Belturbet His two Prisoners were to be exchanged for one Captain Mac Gwire then Prisoner at Crum a small Castle and the only place that stood out against King James in that County the owner of the Castle was one Captain Creighton who permitted Captain Mac Gwire to go to Belturbet on his parol to be a true Prisoner Mac Gwire so negotiated the matter that he return'd with a Summons and proposals as well for Inniskilling as the Castle of Crum and he suppos'd them not averse to a Surrender on good terms but the Lord Galmoy immagined that these Proposals would make the People of Crum secure and therefore that very Night without waiting for any answer he march'd to the Castle before they were aware and had almost surpriz'd them but the resolution of those within prevented the success of his perfidious design and forc'd him back without being able to do any other mischeif than the venting his Anger on his two Prisoners whom after his return to Belturbet he contrary to his Faith and Engagement hang'd on a Sign-Post and suffer'd their Bodies to lie unburied and be barbarously abused This was Captain Mac Gwires own account of the matter the consequence of which falshood was that those People would never hear of any terms afterwards and upon trial found much more safety in their Arms than in the Promises of King James or of any of his Party having baffled and cut off several considerable Bodies of his Forces sent against them and taken many and considerable prisoners whom yet they used with all Humanity as it were to reproach the barbarous and perfidious usage which their Prisoners met with but it was avowed and profest by the generality of King James's Men that they did not look on themselves to be obliged to treat the Rebels of the North as they call'd them as fair Enemies but as Traitors and infamous Persons whom they might destroy at any rate In the County of Longford some Protestants got into the Castle of Kenaught belonging to Sir Thomas Newcomen his Lady and those with her surrendred it on Articles January 13. 1689 to Brigadier Nugent slain afterwards by the Inniskillin Men at Cavan one of the Articles was for the Goods belonging to those in the House and their Friends notwithstanding which Nugent seiz'd and took away several parcels of Goods and several that were in the House as soon as they came out were plundered and stript naked Another Article was that the House of Kenaught should not be Burnt nor Injured notwithstanding which it was burnt to the Ground by Colonel Cohannaught Mac Gwire In short it was observ'd that amongst all the Articles into which King James or his Officers entred they never kept any to Protestants 5 A fifth Invasion on our Lives was that both King James and his inferiour Officers took on them to dispose of them by private Orders and Proclamations the penalty of violating which was often present Death thus the Proclamation that required us to bring in our Arms was on the Penalty of being left to the discretion of the Soldiers which was to expose our Lives and Fortunes to the Mercy of our greatest Enemies By a Proclamation dated July 20th 1689 all Protestants are required to bring in their Swords and other Arms on penalty of being dealt with as Rebels and Traitors The Proclamation dated June 15. 1690 forbad any to change a Guiney c. for more than 36 s. in Brass under pain of death and Colonel Lutterel published a Declaration forbidding more than five Protestants to assemble together or to be out of their Lodgings after Ten of the Clock at Night on the same Penalty the Declaration was of his own Penning and to gratifie the Curious I have put it in the Appendix the order to the Ministers to number the Protestants was likewise Penned by him and in it he declared that every one who did not enter in their Names by a certain Day should be treated as a Spy or Enemy nay sometimes he took on him to make Death the penalty of his verbal orders without a Declaration published Thus he commanded the Fellows and Scholars of the Colledge of Dublin upon pain of Death not to meet together or converse above Two or Three at a time and he would needs hang Mr. Piercy the Merchant as I shewed before without any notice given for saying that he was unwilling to part with his Goods In April 1690. The Quarter-Sessions for the County of Dublin were held at Kilmainham near Dublin Colonel Lutterel Governour of Dublin was on the Bench and in a Speech declared that King James wanted Wheat and other Grain for his Horses and that he had given the Countrey Farmers Three Weeks to bring in their Corn and had waited for their complyance during that time that he resolv'd to wait further til the Saturday after and if they did not bring it in by that time he would compel them that it was the King's will they should do it and he the King's Servant who would see his Masters Commands Executed and with a grear Oath swore he would hang that Man before his own Door that did not obey and bring in his Corn according to order Of this Speech the whole Bench and Country were Witnesses May the 7. 1690. the Lord Mayor thought fit to reinforce a former Proclamation about the rate of Goods in the Market but Colonel Lutterell did not think the Mayors Order sufficient and therefore published an Order of his own by beat of Drum declaring that whoever transgrest the Lord Mayors Order either by buying or selling should be hanged before their own doors About the same time Brigadier Sarsfield Published an Order requiring all Protestants on the borders to leave their Houses and retire Ten Miles from the Frontiers on pain of Death These were the Laws King James's Council and Ministers prescribed us by their Proclamations and Orders and these were the Acts of his Generals and Governours whom he made Guardians of the Lives and Fortunes of Protestants and yet they all came short of the inhumanity of his Parliament 6. It has been usual in Parliaments to attaint notorious Rebels and Traitors who were too strong for the Law or who being kill'd in their Rebellion could not be tryed or condemned by the ordinary course of it and when one or two in a King's Reign were thus attainted upon the most evident Proof and notoriety of the Fact it was counted a great matter even in the late Irish Rebellion none were attainted
but by the legal course of Juries But King James and his Parliament intended to do the work of Protestants speedily and effectually and not to wait the slow methods of proceeding at the Common Law They resolv'd therefore on a Bill of Attainder and in order to it every Member of the House of Commons return'd the Names of such Protestant Gentlemen as liv'd near him or in the County or Burrough for which he serv'd and if he was a stranger to it he sent into the County or Place for information they were in great haste and many escaped them on the other hand some that were actually in King James's Service and fighting for him at Derry of which Cornet Edmund Keating Nephew to my Lord Chief Justice Keating was one were return'd as absent and attainted in the Act. When they had made a Collection of Names they cast them into several Forms and attainted them under several Qualifications and accordingly allow'd them time to come in and put themselves on Tryal the Qualifications and Numbers were as follow 1. Persons Attainted of Rebellion who had time given them till till the Tenth of August to surrender themselves and be tryed provided they were in the Kingdom and amenable to the Law at the time of making the Act otherwise were absolutely Attainted One Archbishop One Duke Fourteen Earls Seventeen Viscounts and one Viscountess Two Bishops Twelve Barons Twenty six Baronets Twenty two Knights Fifty six Clergymen Eleven hundred fifty three Esquires Gentlemen c. 2. Persons who were absentees before the Fifth of Novem. 1688 not returning according to the Proclamation of the Twenty fifth of March attainted if they do not appear by the First of September 1689. One Lord. Seven Knights Eight Clergymen Sixty five Esquires Gentlemen c. 3. Persons who were Absentees before the Fifth of November 1688. not returning according to the Proclamation of the Twenty fifth of March attainted if they do not appear by the First day of October 1689. One Archbishop One Earl One Viscount Five Bishops Seven Baronets Eight Knights Nineteen Clergymen Four hunder'd thirteen Esquires Gentlemen c. 4. Persons usually resident in England who are to signifie their Loyalty in case the King goes there the First of October 1689. and on His Majesties Certificate to the Chief Governour here they to be discharged otherwise to stand attainted One Earl Fifteen Viscounts and Lords Fourteen Knights Four hunder'd ninety two Esquires Gentlemen c. 5. Absentees by reason of sickness and noneage on proving their Loyalty before the last day of the first Term after their return to be acquitted and restor'd in the mean time their Estates Real and Personal are vested in His Majesty One Earl Seven Countesses One Viscountess Thirteen Ladies One Baronet Fifty nine Gentlemen and Gentlewomen 6. They vest all Lands c. belonging to Minors Ladies Gentlewomen in the King till they return and then upon Proof of their Loyalty and Faithfulness to King James they are allow'd to sue for their Estates before the Commissioners for executing the Acts of Repeal and Attainder if sitting or in the High Court of Chancery or Court of Exchequer and upon a Decree obtain'd for them there the Sheriffs are to put them in possession of so much as by the Decree of one of those Courts shall be adjudged them The Clauses in the Act are so many and so considerable that it never having been printed intire I thought it convenient to put it into the Appendix Perhaps it was never equall'd in any Nation since the time of the Proscription in Rome and not then neither for here is more than half as many Condemned in the small Kingdom of Ireland as was at that time proscribed in the greatest part of the then known World yet that was esteemed an unparallel'd Cruelty When Sir Richard Nagle Speaker of the House of Commons presented the Bill to King James for his Royal Assent he told him that many were attainted in that Act by the House of Commons upon such Evidence as fully satisfied the House the rest of them were attainted he said upon common Fame A Speech so very brutish that I can hardly perswade my self that I shall gain credit to the Relation but it is certainly true the Houses of Lords and Commons of their pretended Parliament are Witnesses of it and let the World judge what security Protestants could have of their Lives when so considerable a Lawyer as Sir Richard Nagle declares in so solemn an occasion and King James with his Parliament approves that common Fame is a sufficient Evidence to deprive without hearing so many of the Gentry Nobility and Clergy of their Lives and Fortunes without possibility of pardon and not not only cut off them but their Children and Posterity likewise By a particular Clause from advantages of which the former Laws of the Kingdom would not have deprived them though their Fathers had been found guilty of the worst of Treasons in particular Tryals 7. I shall only add a few Observations on this Act and leave the Reader to make others as he shall find occasion 1. Then this Act leaves no room for the King to pardon after the last day of November 1689. if the Pardon be not Enroll'd before that time the Act declares it absolutely void and null 2. The Act was conceal'd and no Protestant for any Money permitted to see it much less take a Copy of it till the time limited for Pardons was past at least Four Months So that the State of the Persons here attainted is desperate and irrecoverable except an Irish Popish Parliament will relieve them for King James took care to put it out of the power of any English Parliament as well as out of his own Power to help them by consenting to another Act of this pretended Parliament Intituled An Act declaring that the Parliaments of England cannot bind Ireland and against Writs of Errors and Repeals out of Ireland into England 3. It is observable with what hast and confusion this Act was drawn up and past perhaps no man ever heard of such a crude imperfect thing so ill digested and compos'd past on the World for a Law We find the same Person brought in under different Qualifications in one Place he is expresly allow'd till the First of October to come and submit to Tryalâ— and yet in another Place he is attainted if he do not come in by the First of September many are attainted by wrong Names many have their Christian Names left out and many whose Names and Sirnames are both put in are not distinguished by any Character whereby they may be known from others of the same Names 4. Many considerable Persons are left out which certainly had been put in if they could have gotten their Names which is a further proof of their hast and confusion in passing the Bill It is observable the Provost Fellowâ— and Scholars of the Colledge by Dublin are all omitted the Reason was
and 't is like more are vacant since It is true the Church has power to nominate Bishops without the consent of the Civil Magistrate but then they must not expect the Temporalities which are the Gifts or Grants of Kings and such Bishops and Clergy must intirely depend on the voluntary Contributions of their People for their maintenance and on their voluntary submission for their Juisdiction And here the Protestant Clergy had the greatest reason in the world to complain of King James to set him on the Throne the Clergy disobliged many of their People and he in requital deprived them of all other Worldly Support or Power besides what must depend on the free choice of those very People whom for his sake they had not only disobliged but likewise help'd to bring under many Inconveniencies SECT XVI 2. King James took away the maintenance of the present Protestant Clergy 1. BUT King James did not only endeavour to hinder the Education and Succession of the Protestant Clergy but he likewise took away all their present maintenance Immediately upon his coming to the Crown their Popish Parishioners began to deny the payment of Book-moneies which is a considerable part of the Ecclesiastical Revenue of Ireland a great part of the Tithes of Ireland are impropriate in some Places the whole Tythes in many Two third Parts and in most the one half and there is little left for the Vicar that serves the Cure except it be the Third part of the Tythes or the small Fees due out of Burials Marriages or Easter Offerings these Dues are call'd commonly Book-moneys and though very inconsiderable in themselves yet make a great part and in some Places the whole of what falls to the Vicar's portion against these the Popish Judges declar'd in their Circuits and by their encouragement most People and the Papists universally deny'd to pay them 2. The Priests began to declare that the Tythes belong'd to them and forbad their People to pay them to the Protestant Clergy with this the People complied willingly and for Two years before the late Revolution in England hardly any Tythes were recovered by the Clergy or if any were recovered it was with so much difficulty and cost that they turn'd to very little account 3. They past an Act in their pretended Parliament whereby they took away all Tythes that were payable by Papists and gave them to their own Popish Priests and allow'd them to bring an Action for them at the Common Law to make the recovery of them more easie and yet denyed this to the Protestant Clergy alleadging that they allow'd them still their old means of recovering their Tythes and therefore did them no injury But this was as good as nothing for they had so weaken'd the Ecclesiastical Power and Jurisdiction that it was incapable of compelling the People to obedience and it being necessary to sue out a Writ de excommunicato capiendo in order to force such as were refractory the Popish Chancellor either directly refused to grant the Writ or else laid so many impediments and delays in the way that it cost double the Value of the Tythes sued for to take it out 4. Though they rendered the Protestant Clergy uncapable of enjoying the Tythes of Roman Catholicks yet the Popish Clergy were made capable of enjoying the Protestant Tythes The Case then was thus if a Protestant had a Bishoprick Dignity or other Living by the new Act he must not demand any Tythes or Ecclesiastical Dues from any Roman Catholick and as soon as his Preferment became void by his death cession or absence a Popish Bishop c. was put into the Place and by their Act there needed no more to oblige all Men To repute take and deem a Man to be a Roman Catholick Bishop or Dean of any Place than the King 's signifying him to be so under his Privy Signet and Sign Manual a Power that the Protestants how much soever they magnified the King's Authority never trusted any King with nor other Mortal man whatsoever But as soon as any one became thus Entitled to a Bishoprick c. immediately all the Tythes as well of Protestants as of Papists became due to him with all the Glebes and Ecclesiastical Dues and for the recovery of them he had an Action at Common Law 5. Notwithstanding the Glebes and Protestants Tythes were not given to the Popish Clergy during the incumbency of the present Protestant Incumbents yet the Popish Priests by violence entred on the Glebes where there were any pretending that the King had nothing to do with them and that neither he or his Parliament could hinder the Church of her Rights and this Pretence was so far countenanced that no endeavours whatsoever could get any of these Priests out when once he had gotten possession The Truth is hardly one Parish in ten in the Provinces of Leinster Munster or Connaught have any Glebe left them for either they were never endowed or if they had been at any time endowed with Glebes the many Confusions and new Dispositions of Lands have made them to be forgotten or swallowed up in the Hands of some powerful Parishoners The pretence therefore of the Parliament that they had been kind to the Protestant Clergy in leaving them the Glebes was a meer piece of Hypocrisie since they knew that generally Parishes had no Glebes and that where they had Glebes the Priests would make a shift to get into possession of them without being given to them by the Parliament 6. The same may be said of their leaving some of the Tythes belonging to Protestants for the present to their own Clergy They had so robb'd and plundered the Protestants of the Country that few liv'd or had any thing Tithable in it being forced for their own safety to flee to the Towns and leave their Farms wast if any had Tythes they might pay them if they pleas'd or let it alone for they had left the Protestant Clergy as I shew'd before no way of recovering their Dues Many times the Priests came with a Company of the next quarter'd Dragoons and took the Tythes away by force and this past for a Possession of the Livings and the Protestant Ministers must bring their Leases of Ejectment if they would recover their Possessions or pretend any more to Tythes in those Livings There is a Custom in Ireland whereby some Farmers do agree with their Neighbours to plow their Lands for them on Condition that they afford them a certain quantity of Corn suppose an Half one Third or one Fourth after it is reaped Now Protestants that had Farms in the Country being in no capacity to plow them after their Horses were taken away and their Houses robb'd agreed with their Popish Neighbours to plow their Lands for them according to the Custom of the Country this was enough to Entitle Priests to the Tythes of Lands so plowed and accordingly they seiz'd upon them by force though both the Land
seized on most of the Churches in the Kingdom 4. The manner of their doing it was thus The Mayor or Governour in the Towns with the Priests went to the Churches sent for the Keys to the Sextons and if they were found forced them from them if not they broke open the Doors pull'd up the Seats and Reading Desk and having said Mass in them lookt upon them as their own and said the King himself had then nothing to do with them being consecrated places and to alienate them or give them back to Hereticks was Sacriledge In the Country the Militia Captains or Officers of the Army that chanced to be quartered in the several places performed the same part that the Mayors or Governors did in Corporations thus Christ's Church in Dublin was seized by Luttrel the Governour and about Twenty six Churches and Chappels in the Diocess of Dublin 5. Of this Protestants complained to King James as a great violation of his own Act for Liberty of Conscience in which it is expresly provided that they should have Liberty to meet in such Churches Chappels and other places as they shall have for that purpose they further represented to him That all the Churches of Ireland were in a manner ruined in the late War in 1641. That it was with great difficulty and cost that the Protestants had new built or repaired them That many were built by private Persons on their own Costs and that the Roman Catholicks had no Pretence or Title to them but his Majesty answered That they were seiz'd in his absence at the Camp without his knowledge or consent That nevertheless he was so much obliged to his Roman Catholick Clergy that he must not dispossess them that they alledged a Title to the Churches that they had seiz'd and if the Protestants thought their Title was better they must bring their Action and endeavour to recover their Possessions by Law 6. This Answer was what the Attorney General had suggested to him and the Reader will perceive that the whole was a piece of deceit that the pretence of the Churches being seiz'd whilst his Majesty was absent was a meer Collusion and that there could not be a more false Suggestion than that the Papists had any Right to the Churches or a more unjust thing than to put the Protestants on recovering a Possession by a Suit at Law which was gotten from them by so open violence but this was the Justice we lookt for and constantly met with from him and therefore there being no Remedy to be expected we were forced to acquiesce 7. Only to colour the matter a little and lest this should make too great a noise in England and Scotland where King James at this time had very encouraging hopes he issued out a Proclamation December 13. 1689. in which he acknowledges that the seizing of Churches was a violation of the Act for Liberty of Conscience yet doth not order any restitution only forbids them to seize any more They had in many places notice of this Proclamation before it came out and therefore were more diligent to get into the remaining Churches for they look't on the Proclamation as a confirmation of their Possessions which they had before the publishing of it and in some places the Popish Officers kept it from being published till they had done their Work the Protestants not being allowed to go out of their Parishes could not come by it till it pleas'd their Popish Neighbours to produce it and so it prov'd like other Proclamations of his Majesty in favour of his Protestant Subjects it was not published till the inconveniency it pretended to prevent was brought upon them and the mischief actually executed and it made their Enemies more hasty and diligent to do it than otherwise they would have been lest they should slip the time and lose the opportunity 8. But after all some were too late and the Protestants got sight of the Proclamation before their Churches were seiz'd but here the Priests put off their Vizors and acted bare-faced they told the People the King had nothing to do with them or their Churches that they were immediately under the Pope and that they would neither regard him nor his Proclamations or Laws made to the damage of Holy Church 9. The Protestants had a mind to make an Experiment how far this would go and whether the Priests or King would get the better in order therefore to make the Tryal they chose out some Instances in which the violence and injustice of turning them out of their Churches were most undenyable and laid their Case before His Majesty and his Council by their Petitions and that the Petitions might not be laid aside or lost as was the common Custom to deal with Petitions and Affidavits to which they were ashamed to return a flat denial they engaged some of the Privy Council to espouse their Cause and had the luck to gain several of the Popish Nobility to favour their Suits especially of such as had Estates in England and knew King James's true Interest and their own 10. The Petitions of Waterford and Wexford were the most favourably received and in spite of all the opposition that the Attorny General Nagle or the Sollicitor General one Butler who concern'd himself with singular impudence against the Petitions could make they obtained an Order for restitution of these two Churches the Wexford Petition sets forth the Loyalty of the Minister the peaceableness of the People their having contributed to the building of several Popish Chappels within and without the Walls of that Town and that the Roman Catholiks had no occasion for the Church the reasonableness of this Petition was so manifest that King James and his Council made an Order for the restitution of the Church but he now found how precariously he reign'd in Ireland notwithstanding their mighty professions of Loyalty and absolute Subjection upon all occasions and more particularly in their Act of Recognition for the Mayors and Officers refused to obey his Order 11. Upon which he was importuned by the Protestants with new Complaints but being ashamed to own his want of power to make good his former Order he referr'd the Waterford Petition to the then Governour of that place the Earl of Tyrone who reported that the Church of Waterford was a Place of strength and consequently not fit to be trusted into the Hands of Protestants and so all they obtain'd by their Petition Attendance and Charges was to have their Church turn'd into a Garrison instead of a Mass-house this pretence could not be made for the Church of Wexford it having no appearance of strength and therefore the Order for restoring it was renewed and the disobedient Mayor sent for and turn'd out for which the Popish Clergy made him ample satisfaction but notwithstanding that King James appear'd most zealous to have the Church restored and express'd himself with more passion than was usual that he would be obeyed and
at once inriched and civilized it would hardly be believed it were the same Spot of Earth Nay Over-flown and Moorish Grounds were reduced to the bettering of the Soyl and Air. The Purchasers who brought the Kingdom to this flourishing Condition fly to your Majesty for Succour offering not only their Estates and Fortunes but even their Lives to any Legal Trial within this your Majesties Kingdom being ready to submit their Persons and Estates to any established Judicature where if it shall be found that they enjoy any thing without Legal Title or done any thing that may forfeit what they have Purchased they will sit down and most willingly acquiesce in the Judgments But to have their Purchases made void their Lands and Improvements taken from them their Securities and Assurances for Money Lent declar'd Null and Void by a Law made ex post facto is what was never practised in any Kingdom or Countrey If the Bill now design'd to be made a Law had been attempted within two three four or five years after the Court for the execution of these Acts was ended the Purchasers would not have laid out their Estates in acquiring of Lands or in Building or Improving on them Thousands who had sold small Estates and Free-holds in England and brought the Price of them to Purchase or Plant here wou'd have stayed at home And your Majesties Revenue with that of the Nobility and Gentry had never come to the Height it did If your Majesty please to consider upon what Grounds and Assurances the Purchasers of Lands and Tenements in this Kingdom proceed you will soon conclude that never any proceeded upon securer Grounds The Acts of xvij and xviij of King Charles your Father of blessed Memory the First takes notice that there was a Rebellion begun in this Kingdom on the 23d of October 1641 And so doth a Bill once read in the House of Lords whoever looks into the Royal Martyrs Discourse upon that Occasion will see with what an abhorrence he laments it and that he had once thoughts of coming over in Person to suppress it Those Acts promise Satisfaction out of Forfeited Lands to such as would advance Money for reducing these disturbers of the publick Peace unto their Duty The Invitation was his late Majesties your Royal Brothers Letters from Breda some few weeks before his Restauration which hapned the 29th of May 1660 And within six Months after came forth his Majesties most Gracious Declaration for the Settlement of this Kingdom This may it please your Majesty is the Basis and Foundation of the Settlement and was some years after Enacted and made a Law by two several Acts of Parliament It is true that the Usurping Powers in the Year 1653. having by the permission of the Almighty as a just Judgment on us for our Sins prevailed here did dispose and set out the Estates of Catholicks unto Adventurers and Soldiers and in a year or two after transplanted out Catholick Free-holders for no other Reason but their being so in Connought where Lands were set out unto them under divers Qualifications which they and their Heirs or those deriving under them as Purchasers enjoy'd and still do enjoy under the Security of the before mentioned Acts of Parliament and Declaration His Majesties gracious Declaration of the 30th of November 1660. which I call the Foundation of the Settlement was before it was concluded on under the Consideration of that great Prince and the Lords of his Council of England where all Persons concerned for the Proprietors as well old as new were heard whoever reads will find the many Difficulties which he and his Council met with from the different and several Pretenders what Consideration was had and Care taken to reconcile the jarring Interests and to accommodate and settle as well as was possible the Mass and Body of Subjects here It was some years after before the Act for the Execution of his Majesties most Gracious Declaration became a Law It was neer two years upon the Anvil It was not a Law that past in few days or sub silentio It was first according to the then Course of passing Laws here framed by the Chief Governour and Council of this Kingdom by the Advice and with the Assistance of all the Judges and of his Majesties Council Learned in the Law and then transmitted into England to be further consider'd of by his Majesty and Lords of his Council there where the Counsel at Law and Agents of all Pretenders to the Propriety of Lands in this Kingdom were heard and that Act commonly called the Act of Settlement approved of and retransmitted under the Seal of England to receive the Royal Assent which it did after having passed both Houses of Parliament The Innocent Proprietors being restored pursuant to thiâ— Act and some Difficulties appearing as to the further execution of it Another Act passed commonly called the Act of Explanation which went the same Course and under the same Scrutiny It is confessed that though they are two Acts it was by the same Parliament who were chosen according to the ancient Course of Chusing Parliaments But if any miscarriage were in bringing that Parliament together or the procuring the aforesaid Acts of Parliament to pass which we can in no wise admit and the less for that your Majesties Revenue was granted and settled by the same Parliament and many good and wholsom Laws therein Enacted Yet it is manifest that nothing of that kind ought to affect the Plain and honest Purchaser who for great and valuable Considerations acquired Lands under the Security aforesaid and expended the remainder of his Means in Building Improving and Planting on them and that for the following Reasons First The Purchaser advising with his Counsel how to lay out or secure his Money that it may not lie dead not only to his but the publick detriment tells him that he is offer'd a Purchase of Lands in Fee or desired by his Neighbours to accommodate him with Money upon the Security of Judgment or Statute Staple and upon the enquiry into the Title he finds a good and Secure Estate as firm in Law as two Acts of Parliament in force in this Kingdom can make it and in many Cases Letters Patents upon a Commission of Grace for remedying of defective Titles he finds Possession both of many years gone along with this Title several descents past and possibly that the Lands have been purchased and passed through the hands of divers Purchasers He resorts to the Records where he meets with Fines and Common Recoveries the great Assurance known to the Laws of England Under which by the Blessing of God we live and tells him there is no scruple nor difficulty of Purchasing under this Title since he hath Security under two Acts of Parliament Certificates and Letters Patents Fines and Recoveries and that no Law of force in this Kingdom can stir much less shake this Title How is it possible to imagine that the
Settlement and that you made Leases of them on which many and great Improvements have been made It is likewise true that your Majesty sold and exchanged some small proportions of the same Lands and received in Money Twelve Years Purchase some of which your Majesty conveyed by Fines and other assurances in Law and though your Majesty may if it seem meet unto you part with all that Estate yet it is humbly conceived it ought to be with reservation to the Lessees and those few Purchasers as it was done by Mary Queen of England who though zealous in the highest degree to the Religion she professed and that she restored such part of Lands belonging unto Monasteries as remained in her hands undisposed did nevertheless permit the Grantees and Purchasers quietly and peaceably to retain such part of them as they were possessed of by Grant or Purchase and which for ought appearing is enjoyed by them and those deriving under them to this day though she came to the Crown within few years after Passing the Act for Dissolving Monasteries For if no consideration be had of them your Majesty gives away the Term of Years and Improvements from your Lessees and the Land from him to whom your Majesty sold it without restoring the Purchase mony than which no case can be harder and without your Roy-Assent neither of these can be done For the Objections commonly made against the Acts of Settlement and Explanation which are usually that many Innocents were never heard and that there was not time sufficient for hearing of them but how this should affect those who purchased after the Acts passed and Certificates and Letters Patents passed on them is not demonstrable from any Rule of Law or Equity The person designing to Purchase inquires whether the Title of the Land or Tenement to be Sold be good in Law and Equity and being assured in that he forbears further Inquiry being assured that never any Purchaser in Possession having Law and Equity on his side was dispossessed by any person whatsoever upon ground of Equity and the Purchaser here hath the Law with him by the Acts of Settlement and the Equity by the payment of his Money It is to be wished that if Widows Orphans or any other persons have fallen under hardship by the general settlement of the Kingdom that some way may be devised to make them reparation but the way prescribed by this Bill is to Rob the Innocent Purchasers Creditors and Orphans of their Estates to do it contrary to the Publick Faith Laws of the Land and Precept of Holy Writ which forbids doing of Evil that good may come thereof It s manifest by what has been said that if this Bill proceed as is now contrived that all the Protestants in the Kingdom are undoubtedly and without reserve ruined since the Rapparees that is the Armed multitude have taken away all their moveable Estates and this Design is to take away all the Lands and Tenements purchased by them The thriving Catholicks who were Purchasers as most of the Province of Connaught are are likewise to be turned out of their Estates and Possessions and their own and the improvements of those who hold under them utterly lost As to the Politick part which these great Statesmen who drive on this Bill make mention of that will be worthy of consideration It s said that this will unite your Majesties Subjects in this Kingdom That is too gross to pass since the first mentioning thereof hath it not made a division and a breach betwixt them nay where there was none before and doth it not grow daily wider It was never heard that Accommodation between parties that were all in contest could stand unless the terms were continued for if what was given to one of the Parties be taken away it makes the whole Award void and of none effect and admitting the Old Proprietor had right it is not enough except he have it against the Purchaser And if the Design be what is pretended to restore this Kingdom to the Peace and Plenty which it flourished in some years since to unite your Majesties Subjects whereby they may be enabled according to their Duty and Allegiance to restore your Majesty to the exercise of your Royal Dignity in all your Kingdoms this can never be effected except all pretenders recede in some degree from the full of their pretensions for the accommodation of the whole and the publick quiet and safety Would it not be an unreasonable thing in a Cargo where divers Merchants are concerned and have Goods and Merchandizes in a Storm to throw out by consent the Goods of any one Merchant though in the bottom of the Hold and hardest to come by for the safety of all concerned without satisfaction given him by a contribution from those who had the advantage of it or if it could be done or had time for it were it not much more just that the loss should be equally divided amongst them by throwing out a just proportion from all concerned than to single out one part of the people and by their ruine to advance the other This is not in my judgment the readiest way of uniting them Sufferance to make one step more and Quaere Whether the Catholick Purchasers now to be turned out of Possession will join heartily with those that enter upon them Farewel Trade and Commerce where Acts of Parliament shall be made to destroy securities that were good when made Farewell all Improvements in Ireland where no man shall ever know what Estate he hath if the foundation of the general settlement should now be overturned I cannot foresee what the consequences may be of having it published and made known in your Majesties other Kingdoms and Dominions and elsewhere where the Protestant Religion is professed that such a Proposal as this in relation to such of your Protestant Subjects as have made no defection hath been prepared for your Majesties Consideration in order to be passed into a Law and this when they were secure of the Laws of the Land not so much as Common Equity to question the Title by which they held That nevertheless use should be made of the Legislative power to Enact a new Law after so many assurances given them to the contrary and after so many years quiet possession to turn them out of their Estates altogether It is much to be feared that those who first advised this method of Proceedings have considered their own particular advantage and that of their Friends and Relations without the least thoughts of your Majesties Service for surely this can never be thought so nor the way to settle this Kingdom whereby it may be serviceable to your Majesty nor can it be imagined but that men thus despoiled will as often as Parliaments shall be called make application for Redress and Repeal as in the Case of the Spencers to Repeal a Repeal and they and their Posterity will be always solliciting your Majesty and your
Possession and Letters Patents on Record are all blown off at once and nothing left sure or firm in the Kingdom For my part I cannot understand that any Man will Purchase an Acre of Land hereafter when former Purchasers that thought themselves secure are so much discouraged Improvements must perish likewise for by the Petitions that have been preferred to this House your Lordships may perceive that some Proprietors have but small Estates 20 40 or 100 Acres on which Sumptuous Houses and large Gardens and Orchards have been erected and the Income of their Estates is not able to repair the Glass Windows or defray the Wages of the Gardiner And as for Husbandry what between the Old Proprietor that is to be restor'd and cannot Manure the Ground till he is possessed of it and the present Possessor that knows not how long his Term will hold and therefore will be at no Charges upon a Term that depends on the Will of the Commissioners We shall have the Plow neglected and must feed on one another instead of Corn. My Lords This is not all the inconvenience in it but it is likewise to the prejudice of the People in the Kingdom both Protestants and Catholicks The Protestants are already ruin'd by the Rapparees and if their Estates are taken from them I know nothing wanting to make them compleatly miserable The rich Catholicks have as yet escap'd the Depredations of their Neighbours but they will be almost as miserable as the Protestants when their Estates and Improvements are taken from them My Lords This Bill doth likewise destroy the Publick Faith and Credit of the Nation it destroys the Credit of England by Repealing the Act Pass'd there for the Satisfaction of Adventurers it destroys the Publick Faith of Ireland by Repealing the Acts of Settlement and Explanation it violates the Faith of his late Majesty which hath been pass'd to his Subjects in his Gracious Declaration for the Settlement of this Kingdom and in his Letters Patents pursuant to it It subverts the Credit of his present Majesty in his Letters Patents that he hath Pass'd since his coming to the Crown on the Commission of Grace for he has receiv'd the Composition money and if these Grants must be vacated I cannot forbear to speak it plainly that the Subject is deluded it commits a Rape upon the Common Law by making all Fines and Recoveries useless and ineffectual and it invades the Property of every private Subject by destroying all Settlements on valuable Considerations My Lords This Bill is Inconvenient in point of Time Is it now a time for men to seek for Vineyards and Olive yards when a Civil War is rageing in the Nation and we are under Apprehensions I will not say fears for it is below Men of Courage to be afraid of Invasions from abroad is it not better to wait for more peaceable times and Postpone our own Concerns to the Concerns of his Majesty and the publick Peace of the Nation To do otherwise is to divide the Spoyl before we get it to dispose of the Skin before we catch the Beast We cannot in this case set a better President before Us than the Case of the Israelites in the Book of Joshua they had the Land of Canaan given them by God but yet Joshua did not go about to make a Distribution of it to the Tribes till they had subdued their Enemies and the Lord had given them peace Nay My Lords I am confident that it will prejudice His Majesties Service because every Mans eye and heart will be more on his own Concerns than His Majesties Business it is possible that their affections may be more set upon the gaining of their Estates than the Fighting for the King and then all their Endeavours will be drowned in the Consideration of their own profit Moses was Jealous of this when the Two Tribes and an half desired to have their Possessions on this side Jordan before the Land was intirely subdued and there may be the same motives to the like suspitions now My Lords Either there was a REBELLION in this Kingdom or there was not If there was none then we have been very unjust all this while in â—â—eping so many Innocents out of their Estates And God forbid that I should open my Mouth in the Defence of so gross an Injustice but then what shall we say to His Majesties Royal Fathers Declaration in his 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 who there owns that there was a Rebellion and in pursuance of that Opinion passed an Act to secure such as should adventure Money for the suppressing of it Nay What shall we say to the Two Bills that have been brought into this House the one by an Honourable Lord which owns it fully the latter from the Commoners which owns a Rebellion but extenuates it I take it then for granted that there was a Rebellion and if so it was either a total or a partial one If it was a general one then all were guilty of it and none can pretend to be restored to his Estate farther than the King in his Mercy shall think fit to grant it him If it was a partial one then some Discrimination ought to be made between the Innocent and the Guilty The Innocent should be restored and the Guilty excluded from their Estates but here is a Bill that makes no distinction between them but Innocent and Nocent are all to fare alike The one is to be put in as good a Condition as the other and can your Lordships imagine that it is reasonable to do this when we all know that there has been a Court of Claims erected for the Tryal of Innocents that several have put themselves upon the Proof of their Innocence and after a full Hearing of all that they could offer for themselves have been adjudged Nocent My Lords I have Ventur'd Candidly and Impartially to lay my Thoughts before you and I have no other design in it than honestly to acquit my Conscience towards my KING and Country If my Freedom hath given your Lordships any Offence I do here submissively beg your Pardon for it but it is the Concern of the Nation in general that hath made me so warm in this Affair I have but one thing more to add That God would so direct and instruct your hearts that you may pitch upon those Courses that may be for the Honour of the King and the Benefit of the Kingdom Objections against the Particulars of the Bill made by the Lord Bishop of Meath I. No Penalty on such as shall enter without Injunctions II. No Consideration for Improvements III. No Saving for Remainders IV. No Time given to Tenants and Possessors to Remove their Stock and Corn. V. No Provision for Protestant Widows VI. It allows only Reprisals for Original Purchase-Money which is hard to make out and is an Injury to the Second or Third Purchaser No. 24. Copies of the ORDERS for giving Possessions c. Com. Kildare