Let us follow our ancestors,
men not without a rational, though without an exclusive confidence in themsel es,- who, by respecting
the reason of others, who, by looking backward as
well as forward, by the modesty as well as by the
energy of their niinds, went on insensibly drawing
this Constitution nearer and nearer to its perfection,
by never departing from its fundamental principles,
nor introducing any amendment which had not a
subsisting root in the laws, Constitution, and usages
of the kingdom.
men not without a rational, though without an exclusive confidence in themsel es,- who, by respecting
the reason of others, who, by looking backward as
well as forward, by the modesty as well as by the
energy of their niinds, went on insensibly drawing
this Constitution nearer and nearer to its perfection,
by never departing from its fundamental principles,
nor introducing any amendment which had not a
subsisting root in the laws, Constitution, and usages
of the kingdom.
Edmund Burke
201
writings, it would be little worthy of our attention:
contemptible these writings are in every sense. But
they are not the cause, they are the disgusting symptoms of a frightful distemper. They are not otherwise of consequence than as they show the evil habit of the bodies from whence they come. In that light
the meanest of them is a serious thing. If, however,
I should underrate them, and if the truth is, that
they are not the result, but the cause, of the disorders
I speak of, surely those who circulate operative poisons, and give to whatever force they have by their
nature the further operation of their authority and
adoption, are to be censured, watched, and, if possible, repressed.
At what distance the direct danger from such factions may be it is not easy to fix. An adaptation of
circumstances to Ulesigns and principles is necessary.
But these cannot be wanting for any long time, in
the ordinary course of sublunary affairs. Great discontents frequently arise in the best constituted governments from causes which no human wisdom can foresee and no human power can prevent. They occur at uncertain periods, but at periods which are
not commonly far asunder. Governments of all kinds
are administered only by men; and great mistakes,
tending to inflame these discontents, may concur.
The indecision of those who happen to rule at the
critical time, their supine neglect, or their precipitate
and ill-judged attention, may aggravate the public
misfortunes. In such a state of things, the principles, now only sown, will shoot out and vegetate in
full luxuriance. In such circumstances the minds
of the people become sore and ulcerated. They are
put out of humor with all public men and all public
? ? ? ? 202 APPEAL FROM THE NEW
parties; they are fatigued with their dissensions;
they are irritated at their coalitions; they are made
easily to believe (what much pains are taken to make
them believe) that all oppositions are factious, and
all courtiers base and servile. From their disgust at
men, they are soon led to quarrel with their frame of
government, which they presume gives nourishment
to the vices, real or supposed, of those who administer in it. Mistaking malignity for sagacity, they
are soonl led to cast off all hope from a good administration of affairs, and come to think that all reformation depends, not on a change of actors, but upon an alteration in the machinery. Then will be felt
the full effect of encouraging doctrines which tend
to make the citizens despise their Constitution. Then
will be felt the plenitude of the mischief of teaching
the people to believe that all ancient institutions are
the results of ignorance, and that all prescriptive government is in its nature usurpation. Then will be
felt, in all its energy, the danger of encouraging a
spirit of litigation in persons of that immature and
imperfect state of knowledge which serves to render
them susceptible of doubts, but incapable of their
solution. Then will be felt, in all its aggravation,
the pernicious consequence of destroying all docility
in the minds of those who are not formed for finding
their own way in the labyrinths of political theory,
and are made to reject the clew and to disdain the
guide. Then will be felt, and too late will be acknowledged, the ruin which follows the disjoining of
religion from the state, the separation of morality
from policy, and the giving conscience no concern
and no coactive or coercive force in the most material of all the social ties, the principle of our obligations to government.
? ? ? ? TO THE OLD WHIGS. 203
I know, too, that, besides this vain, contradictory,
and self-destructive security which some men derive
from the habitual attachment of the people to this
Constitution, whilst they suffer it with a sort of sportive acquiescence to be brought into contempt before
their faces, they have other grounds for removing all
apprehension from their minds. They are of opinion
that there are too many men of great hereditary estates and influence in the kingdom to suffer the establishment of the levelling system which has taken place in France. This is very true, if, in order to
guide the power which now attends their property,
these men possess the wisdom which is involved in
early fear. But if, through a supine security, to which
such fortunes are peculiarly liable, they neglect the
use of their influence in the season of their power,
on the first derangement of society the nerves of
their strength will be cut. Their estates, instead of
being the means of their security, will become the
very causes of their danger. Instead of bestowing
influence, they will excite rapacity. They will be
looked to as a prey.
Such will be the impotent. condition of those men
of great hereditary estates, who indeed dislike the designs that are carried on, but whose dislike is rather
that of spectators than of parties that may be concerned in the catastrophe of the piece. But riches
do not in all cases secure even an inert and passive
resistance. There are always in that description men
whose fortunes, when their minds are once vitiated
by passion or by evil principle, are by no means a
security from their actually taking their part against
the public tranquillity. We see to what low and despicable passions of all kinds many men in that class
? ? ? ? 204 APPEAL FROM THE NEW
are ready to sacrifice the patrimonial estates which
might be perpetuated in their families with splendor,
and with the fame of hereditary benefactors to mankind, from generation to generation. Do we not see how lightly people treat their fortunes, when under
the influence of the passion of gaming? The game
of ambition or resentment will be played by many of
the rich and great as desperately, and with as much
blindness to the consequences, as ally other game.
Was he a man of no rank or fortune who first set
on foot the disturbances which have ruined France?
Passion blinded him to the consequences, so far as
they concerned himself; and as to the consequences
with regard to others, they were no part of his consideration, - nor ever will be with those who bear any resemblance to that virtuous patriot and lover of the
rights of man.
There is also a time of insecurity, when interests
of all sorts become objects of speculation. Then it
is that their very attachment to wealth and importance will induce several persons of opulence to list themselves and even to take a lead with the party
which they think most likely to prevail, in order to
obtain to themselves consideration in some new order or disorder of things. They may be led to act
in. this manner, that they may secure some portion
of their own property, and perhaps to become partakers of the spoil of their own order. Those who speculate on change always make a great number
among people of rank and fortune, as well as amongst
the low and the indigent.
What security against all this -- All human securities are liable to uncertainty. But if anything
bids fail for the prevention of so great a calamity,
? ? ? ? TO THE OLD WHIGS. 205
it must consist in the use of the ordinary means of
just influence inll society, whilst those means continue
unimpaired. The public judgment ought to receive
a proper direction. All weighty men may have their
share in so good a work. As yet, notwithstanding
the strutting and lying independence of a braggart
philosophy, Nature maintains her rights, and great
names have great prevalence. Two such men as Mr.
Pitt and Mr. Fox, adding to their authority in a point
in which they concur even by their disunion in everything else, might frown these wicked opinions out of
the kingdom. But if the influence of either of them,
or the influence of men like them, should, against
their serious intentions, be otherwise perverted, they
may countenance opinions which (as I have said before, and could wish over and over again to press)
they may in vain attempt to control. In their theory,
these doctrines admit no limit, no qualification whatsoever. No man can say how far he will go, who
joins with those who are avowedly going to the utmost extremities. What security is there for stopping short at all in these wild conceits? Why, neither more nor less than this,. - that the moral sentiments
of some few amongst them do put some check on
their savage theories. But let us take care. The
moral sentiments, so nearly connected with early prejudice as to be almost one and the same thing, will
assuredly not live long under a discipline which has
for its basis the destruction of all prejudices, and the
making the mind proof against all dread of consequences flowing from the pretended truths that are
taught by their philosophy.
In this school the moral sentiments must grow
weaker and weaker every day. The more cautious
? ? ? ? 206 APPEAL FROM THE NEW
of these teachers, in laying down their maxims, draw
as much of the conclusion as suits, not with their
premises, but with their policy. They trust the rest
to the sagacity of their pupils. Others, and these are
the most vaunted for their spirit, not only lay down
the same premises, but boldly draw the conclusions, to
the destruction of our whole Constitution in Church
and State. But are these conclusions truly drawn?
Yes, most certainly. -Their principles are wild and
wicked; but let justice be done even to frenzy and
villany. These teachers are perfectly systematic.
No man who assumes their grounds can tolerate
the British Constitution in Church or State. These
teachers profess to scorn all mediocrity,- to engage
for perfection, - to proceed by the simplest and shortest course. They build their politics, not on convenience, but on truth; and they profess to conduct men to certain happiness by the assertion of their
undoubted rights. With them there is no compromise All other governments are usurpations, which
justify and even demand resistance.
Their principles always go to the extreme. They
who go with the principles of the ancient Whigs,
which are those contained in Mr. Burke's book,
never can go too far. They may, indeed, stop short
of some hazardous and ambiguous excellence, which
they will be taught to postpone to any reasonable
degree of good they may actually possess. The
opinions maintained in that book never can lead to
an extreme, because their foundation is laid in an
opposition to extremes. The foundation of government is there laid, not in imaginary rights of men,
(which at best is a confusion of judicial with civil
principles,) but in political convenience, and in hu
? ? ? ? TO THE OLD WHIGS. 207
man nature, -either as that nature is universal, or
as it is modified by local habits and social aptitudes.
The foundation of government (those who have read
that book will rec6llect) is laid in a provision for our
wants and in a conformity to our duties: it is to purvey for the one, it is to enforce the other. These
doctrines do of themselves gravitate to a middle
point, or to some point near a middle. They suppose, indeed, a certain portion of liberty to be essential to all good government; but they infer that this liberty is to be blended into the government, to harmonize with its forms and its rules, and to be made
subordinate to its end. Those who are not with that
book are with its opposite; for there is no medium
besides the medium itself. That medium is not such
because it is found there, but it is found there because it is conformable to truth and Nature. In this
we do not follow the author, but we and the author
travel together upon the same safe and middle path.
The theory contained in his book is not to furnish
principles for making a new Constitution, but for
illustrating the principles of a Constitution already
made. It is a theory drawn from the fact of our
government. They who oppose it are bound to
show that his theory militates with that fact; otherwise, their quarrel is not with his book, but with the
Constitution of their country. The whole scheme of
our mixed Constitution is to prevent any one of its
principles from being carried as far as, taken by itself, and theoretically, it would go. Allow that to
be the true policy of the British system, then most
of the faults with which that system stands charged
will appear to be, not imperfections into which it has
inadvertently fallen, but excellencies which it has
? ? ? ? 208 APPEAL FROM THE NEW
studiously sought. To avoid the perfections of extreme, all its several parts are so constituted as not
alone to answer their own several ends, but also each
to limit and control the others; insomuch that, take
which of the principles you please, you will find its
operation checked and stopped at a certain point.
The whole movement stands still rather than that
any part should proceed beyond its boundary. From
thence it results that in the British Constitution
there is a perpetual treaty and compromise going
on, sometimes openly, sometimes with less observation. To him who contemplates the British Constitution, as to him who contemplates the subordinate material world, it will always be a matter of his most
curious investigation to discover the secret of this
mutual limitation.
Finita potestas denique cuique
Quanam sit ratione, atque alte terminus hxerens
They who have acted, as in France they have done,
upon a scheme wholly different, and who aim at the
abstract and unlimited perfection of power in the popular part, can be of no service to us in any of our
political arrangements. They who in their headlong
career have overpassed the goal can fiurnish no example to those who aim to go no further. The temerity of such speculators is no more an example than the timidity of others. The one sort scorns the right;
the other fears it; both miss it. But those who by
violence go beyond the barrier are without question
the most mischievous; because, to go beyond it, they
overturn and destroy it. To say they have spirit
is to say nothing in their praise. The untempered
spirit of madness, blindness, immorality, and impiety deserves no commendation. He that sets his
? ? ? ? TO THE OLD WHIGS. 209
house on fire because his fingers are frost-bitten
can never be a fit instructor in the method of providing our habitations with a cheerful and salutary warmth. We want no foreign examples to rekindle
in us the flame of liberty. The example of our own
ancestors is abundantly sufficient to maintain the
spirit of freedom in its full vigor, and to qualify it
in all its exertions. The example of a wise, moral,
well-natured, and well-tempered spirit of freedom is
that alone which can be useful to us, or in the least
degree reputable or safe. Our fabric is so constituted, one part of it bears so much on the other,
the parts are so made for one another, and for nothing else, that to introduce any foreign matter into it'
is to destroy it.
What has been said of the Roman Empire is at
least as true of the British Constitution: -" Octingentorum annorumrn fortuna disciplinaque compages hcec coaluit; quce convelli sine convellentium exitio non potest. " This British Constitution has not been struck out at an heat by a set of presumptuous men, like the
Assembly of pettifoggers run mad in Paris.
"'T is not the hasty product of a day,
But the well-ripened fruit of wise delay. "
It is the result of the thoughts of many minds in
many ages. It is no simple, no superficial thing,
nor to be estimated by superficial understandings.
An ignorant man, who is not fool enough to meddle
with his clock, is, however, sufficiently confident to
think he can safely take to pieces and put together,
at his pleasure, a moral machine of another guise,
importance, and complexity, composed of far other
wheels and springs and balances and counteracting
and cooperating powers. Men little think how imVOL. IV. 14
? ? ? ? 210 APPEAL FROM THE NEW
morally they act in rashly meddling with what they
do not understand. Their delusive good intention
is no sort of excuse for their presumption. They
who truly mean well must be fearful of acting ill.
The British Constitution may have its advantages
pointed out to wise and reflecting minds, but it is
of too high an order of excellence to be adapted to
those which are common. It takes in too many
views, it makes too many combinations, to be so
much as comprehended by shallow and superficial
understandings. Profound thinkers will know it in
its reason and spirit. The less inquiring will recognize it in their feelings and their experience. They
will thank God they have a standard, which, in the
most essential point of this great concern, will put
them on a par with the most wise and knowing.
If we'do not take to our aid the foregone studies
of men reputed intelligent and learned, we shall be
always beginners. But men must learn somewhere;
and the new teachers mean no more than what they
effect, as far as they succeed, - that is, to deprive
men of the benefit of the collected wisdom of mankind, and to make them blind disciples of their own particular presumption. Talk to these deluded creatures (all the disciples and most of the masters) who are taught to think themselves so newly fitted up
and furnished, and you will find nothing in their
houses but the refuse of Knaves' Acre, --nothing but
the rotten stuff, worn out in the service of delusion
and sedition in all ages, and which, being newly
furbished up, patched, and varnished, serves well. enough for those who, being unacquainted with the conflict which has always been maintained between
the sense and the nonsense of mankind, know noth
? ? ? ? TO THE OLD WHIGS. 211
ing of the former existence and the ancient refutation of the same follies. It is near two thousand
years since it has been observed that these devices
of ambition, avarice, and turbulence were antiquated. They are, indeed, the most ancient of all commonplaces: commonplaces sometimes of good and necessary causes; more frequently of the worst, but
which decide upon neither. Eadem semper causa,
libido et avaritia, et mutandarum rerum amor. C(eterum libertas et speciosa nomina pretexuntur; nee
quisquanz alienum servitium, et dominationerm sibi concupivit, ut non eadem ista vocabula usurparet.
Rational and experienced men tolerably well know,
and have always known, how to distinguish between
true and false liberty, and between the genuine adherence and the false pretence to what is true. But
none, except those who are profoundly studied, can
comprehend the elaborate contrivance of a fabric fitted to unite private and public liberty with public
force, with order, with peace, with justice, and, above
all, with the institutions formed for bestowing permanence and stability, through ages, upon this invaluable whole.
Place, for instance, before your eyes such a man
as Montesquieu. Think of a genius not born in
every country or every time: a man gifted by Nature with a penetrating, aquiline eye, - with a judgment prepared with the most extensive erudition, -- with an Herculean robustness of mind, and nerves not
to be broken with labor,- a man who could spend
twenty years in one pursuit. Think of a man like
the universal patriarch in Milton (who had drawn up
before him in his prophetic vision the whole series of
the generations which were to issue from his loins):
? ? ? ? 212 APPEAL FROM THE NEW
a man capable of placing in review, after having
brought together from the East, the West, the North,
and the South, from the coarseness of the rudest barbarism to the most refined and subtle civilization, all the schemes of government which had ever prevailed
amongst mankind, weighing, measuring, collating,
and comparing them all, joining fact with theory,
and calling into council, upon all this infinite assemblage of things, all the speculations which have fatigued the understandings of profound reasoners
in all times. Let us then consider, that all these
were but so many preparatory steps to qualify a
man, and such a man, tinctured with no national
prejudice, with no domestic affection, to admire, and
to hold out to the admiration of mankind, the Constitution of England. And shall we Englishmen revoke
to such a suit? Shall we, when so much more than
he has produced remains still to be understood and
admired, instead of keeping ourselves in the schools
of real science, choose for our teachers men incapable
of being taught, -whose only claim to know is, that
they have never doubted,- from whom we can learn
nothing but their own indocility, - who would teach
us to scorn what in the silence of our hearts we
ought to adore?
Different from them are all the great critics. They
have taught us one essential rule. I think the ex-. cellent and philosophic artist, a true judge, as well
as a perfect follower of Nature, Sir Joshua Reynolds,.
has somewhere applied it, or something like it, in his
own profession. It is this: that, if ever we should
find ourselves disposed not to admire those writers
or artists (Livy and Virgil, for instance, Raphael or
Michael Angelo) whom all the learned had admired,
? ? ? ? TO THE OLD WHIGS. 213
not to follow our own fancies, but to study them,
until we know how and what we ought to admire;
and if we cannot arrive at this combination of admiration with knowledge, rather to believe that we are
dull than that the rest of the world has been imposed on. It is as good a rule, at least, with regard
to this admired Constitution. We ought to understand it according to our measure, and to venerate
where we are not able presently to comprehend.
Such admirers were our fathers, to whom we owe
this splendid inheritance. Let us improve it with
zeal, but with fear.
Let us follow our ancestors,
men not without a rational, though without an exclusive confidence in themsel es,- who, by respecting
the reason of others, who, by looking backward as
well as forward, by the modesty as well as by the
energy of their niinds, went on insensibly drawing
this Constitution nearer and nearer to its perfection,
by never departing from its fundamental principles,
nor introducing any amendment which had not a
subsisting root in the laws, Constitution, and usages
of the kingdom. Let those who have the trust of
political or of natural authority ever keep watch
against the desperate enterprises of innovation: let
even their benevolence be fortified and armed. They
have before their eyes the example of a monarch insulted, degraded, confined, deposed; his family dispersed, scattered, imprisoned; his wife insulted to his face, like the vilest of the sex, by the vilest of
all populace; himself three times dragged by these
wretches in an infamous triumph; his children torn
from him, in violation of the first right of Nature,
and given into the tuition of the most desperate and
impious of the leaders of desperate and impious cl ubs;
? ? ? ? 214 APPEAL FROM THE NEW
his revenues dilapidated and plundered; his magistrates murdered; his clergy proscribed, persecuted, famished; his nobility degraded in their rank, undone in their fortunes, fugitives in their persons; his armies corrupted and ruined; his whole people impoverished, disunited, dissolved; whilst through the bars *of his prison, and amidst the bayonets of his
keepers, he hears the tumult of two conflicting factions, equally wicked and abandoned, who agree in principles, in dispositions, and in objects, but who
tear each other to pieces about the most effectual
means of obtaining their common end: the one contending to preserve for a while his name, and his person, the more easily to destroy the royal authority,
-the other clamoring to cut off the name, the person, and the monarchy together, by one sacrilegious execution. All this accumulation of calamity, the
greatest that ever fell upon one man, has fallen upon
his head, because he had left his virtues unguarded
by caution,- because he was not taught, that, where
power is concerned, he who will confer benefits must
take security against ingratitude.
I have stated the calamities which have fallen upon
a great prince and nation, because they were not
alarmed at the approach of danger, and because,
what commonly happens to men surprised, they lost
all resource when they were caught in it. When I
speak of danger, I certainly mean to address myself
to those who consider the prevalence of the new Whig
doctrines as an evil.
The Whigs of this day have before them, in this
Appeal, their constitutional ancestors; they have the
doctors of the modern school. They will choose for
themselves. The author of the Reflections has chosen
? ? ? ? TO THE OLD WHIGS. 215
for himself. If a new order is coming on, and all
the political opinions must pass away as dreams,
which our ancestors have worshipped as revelations,
I say for him, that he would rather be the last (as
certainly he is the least) of that race of men than
the first and greatest of those who have coined to
themselves Whig principles from a French die, unknown to the impress of oar fathers in the Constitiution.
? ? ? ? A
LETTER
TO
A PEER OF IRELAND
ON THE
PENAL LAWS AGAINST IRISH CATHOLICS,
PREVIOUS TO
THE LATE REPEAL OF A PART THEREOF IN
THE SESSION OF THE IRISH PARLIAMENT, HELD A. D. 1782.
? ? ? ? LETTER.
CHARLES STREET, LONDON, Feb. 21, 1782.
/[ LORD, -- I am obliged to your Lordship for. L71 your communication of the heads of Mr. Gardiner's bill. I had received it, in an earlier stage of
its progress, from Mr. Braughall; and I am still in
that gentleman's debt, as I have not made him the
proper return for the favor he has done me. Business, to which I was more immediately called, and
in which my sentiments had the weight of one vote,
occupied me every moment since I received his letter. This first morning which I can call my own I
give with great cheerfulness to the subject on which
your Lordship has done me the honor of desiring my
opinion.
I have read the heads of the bill, with the amend
ments. Your Lordship is too well acquainted with
men, and with affairs, to imagine that any true judgment can be formed on the value of a great measure
of pdlicy from the perusal of a piece of paper. At
present I am much in the dark with regard to the
state of the country which the intended law is to
be applied to. It is not easy for me to determine
whether or no it was wise (for the sake of expunging
the black letter of laws which, menacing as they
were in the language, were every day fading into disuse) solemnly to reaffirm the principles and to reenact the provisions of a code of statutes by which
? ? ? ? 220 ON THE PENAL LAWS
you are totally excluded from THE PRIVILEGES OF THE
COMMONWEALTH, from the highest to the lowest, from
the most material of the civil professions, from the
army, and even from education, where alone education is to be had. *
Whether this scheme of indulgence, grounded at
once on contempt and jealousy, has a tendency gradually to produce something better and more liberal, I
cannot tell, for want of having the actual map of the
country. If this should be the case, it was right in
you to accept it, such as it is. But if this should be
one of the experiments which have sometimes been
made before the temper of the nation was ripe for a
real reformation, I think it may possibly have ill effects, by disposing the penal matter in a more systematic order, and thereby fixing a permanent bar against any relief that is truly substantial. The
whole merit or demerit of the measure depends upon
the plans and dispositions of those by whom the act
was made, concurring with the general temper of the
Protestants of Ireland, and their aptitude to admit
in time of some part of that equality without which
you never can be FELLOW-CITIZENS. Of all this I am
wholly ignorant. All my correspondence with men
of public importance in Ireland has for some time
totally ceased. On the first bill for the relief of the
ROMAN CATHOLICS of Ireland, I was, without any call
of mine, consulted both on your side of the water
and on this. On the present occasion, I have not
heard a word from any man in office, and know as
* The sketch of the bill sent to Mr. Burke, along with the repeal
of some acts, reaffirmed many others in the penal code. It was al.
tered afterwards, and the clauses reaffirming the incapacities left out;
but they all still exist, and are in full force.
? ? ? ? AGAINST IRISH CATHOLICS. 221
little of the intentions of the British government as
I know of the temper of the Irish Parliament. I do
not find that any opposition was made by the principal persons of the minority in the House of Commons, or that any is apprehended from them in the House of Lords. The whole of the difficulty seems
to lie with the principal men in government, under
whose protection this bill is supposed to be brought
in. This violent opposition and cordial support, coming from one and the same quarter, appears to me
something mysterious, and hinders me from being
able to make any clear judgment of the merit of the
present measure, as compared with the actual state
of the country and the general views of government,
without which one can say nothing that may not be
very erroneous.
To look at the bill in the abstract, it is neither
more nor less than a renewed act of UNIVERSAL, UNMITIGATED, INDISPENSABLE, EXCEPTIONLESS DISQUALIFICATION.
One would imagine that a bill inflicting such a
multitude of incapacities had followed on the heels
of a conquest made by a very fierce enemy, under
the impression of recent animosity and resentment.
No man, on reading that bill, could imagine he was
reading an act of amnesty and indulgence, following
a recital of the good behavior of those who are the
objects of it, - which recital stood at the head of the
bill, as it was first introduced, but, I suppose for its
incongruity with the body of the piece, was afterwards
omitted. This I say on memory. It, however, still
recites the oath, and that Catholics ought to be considered as good and loyal subjects to his Majesty, his
crown and government. Then follows an universal
? ? ? ? 222 ON THE PENAL LAWS
exclusion of those GOOD and LOYAL subjects from
every (even the lowest) office of trust and profit, -
from any vote at an election, -- from any privilege
in a town corporate, - from being even a freeman of
such a corporation,- from serving on grand juries,
- from a vote at a vestry, - from having a gun in his
house, - from being a barrister, attorney, or solicitor,
&c. , &c. , &c.
This has surely much more the air of a table of
proscription than an act of grace. What must we
suppose the laws concerning those good subjects to
have been, of which this is a relaxation? I know
well that there is a cant language current, about the
difference between an exclusion from employments,
even to the most rigorous extent, and an exclusion
from the natural benefits arising from a man's own
industry. I allow, that, under some circumstances,
the difference is very material in point of justice, and
that there are considerations which may render it
advisable for a wise government to keep the leading
parts of every branch of civil and military administration in hands of the best trust; but a total exclusion from the commonwealth is a very different thing. When a government subsists (as governments formerly did) on an estate of its own, with but few and inconsiderable revenues drawn from the subject, then the few officers which existed in such establishments
were naturally at the disposal of that government,
which paid the salaries out of its own coffeirs: there
an exclusive preference could hardly merit the name
of proscription. Almost the whole produce of a man's
industry at that time remained in his own purse to
maintain his family. But times alter, and the whole
estate of government is from private contribution.
? ? ? ? AGAINST IRISH CATHOLICS. 223
When a very great portion of the labor of individuals goes to the state, and is by the state again refunded to individuals, through the medium of offices, and in this circuitous progress from the private to the
public, and from the public again to the private fiund,
the families from whom the revenue is taken are indemnified, and an equitable balance between the government and the subject is established. But if a great body of the people who contribute to this state
lottery are excluded fromn all the prizes, the stopping
the circulation with regard to them may be a most
cruel hardship, amounting in effect to being double
and treble taxed; and it will be felt as such to the
very quick, by all the families, high and low, of those
hundreds of thousands who are denied their chance
in the returned fruits of their own industry. This
is the thing meant by those who look upon the public
revenue only as a spoil, and will naturally wish to
have as few as possible concerned in the division of
the booty. If a state should be so unhappy as to
think it cannot subsist without such a barbarous proscription, the persons so proscribed ought to be indemnified by the remission of a large part of their taxes, by an immunity from the offices of public burden, and by an exemption from being pressed into
any military or naval service.
Common sense and common justice dictate this at
least, as some sort of compensation to a people for
their slavery. How many families are incapable of
existing, if the little offices of the revenue and little
military commissions are denied them! To deny
them at home, and to make the happiness of acquiring some of them somewhere else felony or high
treason, is a piece of cruelty, in which, till very late
? ? ? ? 224 ON THE PENAL LAWS
ly, I did not suppose this age capable of persisting.
Formerly a similarity of religion made a sort of country for a man in some quarter or other. A refugee
for religion was a protected character. Now the
reception is cold indeed; and therefore, as the asylum
abroad is destroyed, the hardship at home is doubled.
This hardship is the more intolerable because the
professions are shut up. The Church is so of course.
Much is to be said on that subject, in regard to them,
and to the Protestant Dissenters. But that is a chapter by itself. I am sure I wish well to that Church,
and think its ministers among the very best citizens
of your country. However, such as it is, a great walk
in life is forbidden ground to seventeen hundred
thousand of the inhabitants of Ireland. Why are
they excluded from the law? Do not they expend
money in their suits? Why may not they indemnify
themselves, by profiting, in the persons of some, for
the losses incurred by others? Why may not they
have persons of confidence, whom they may, if they
please, employ in the agency of their affairs? The
exclusion from the law, from grand juries, from sheriffships and under-sheriffships, as well as from freedom in any corporation, may subject them to dreadful hardships, as it may exclude them wholly from all
that is beneficial and expose them to all that is mischievous in a trial by jury. This was manifestly
within my own observation, for I was three times in
Ireland from the year 1760 to the year 1767, where
I had sufficient means of information concerning the
inhuman proceedings (among which were many cruel
murders, besides an infinity of outrages and oppressions unknown before in a civilized age) which prevailed during that period, in consequence of a pre
? ? ? ? AGAINST IRISH CATHOLICS. 225
tended conspiracy among Roman Catholics against the
king's government. I could dilate upon the mischiefs that may happen, from those which have happened, upon this head of disqualification, if it were at all necessary.
The head of exclusion from votes for members
of Parliament is closely connected with the former.
When you cast your eye on the statute-book, you
will see that no Catholic, even in the ferocious acts
of Queen Anne, was disabled from voting on account
of his religion. The only conditions required for
that privilege were the oaths of allegiance and abjuration, -both oaths relative to a civil concern.
Parliament has since added another oath of the same
kind; and yet a House of Commons, adding to the
securities of government in proportion as its danger
is confessedly lessened, and professing both confidence
and indulgence, in effect takes away the privilege left
by an act full of jealousy and professing persecution.
The. taking away of a vote is the taking away the
shield which the subject has, not only against the
oppression of power, but that worst of all oppressions,
the persecution of private society and private manners. No candidate for Parliamentary influence is
obliged to the least attention towards them, either
in cities or counties. On the contrary, if they should
become obnoxious to any bigoted or malignant people amongst whom they live, it will become the interest of those who court popular favor to use the numberless means which always reside in magistracy
and influence to oppress them. The proceedings in
a certain county in Munster, during the unfortunate
period I have mentioned, read a strong lecture on
VOL. IV. 15
? ? ? ? 226 ON THE PENAL LAWS
the cruelty of depriving men of that shield on account of their speculative opinions. The Protestants
of Ireland feel well and naturally on the hardship of
being bound by laws in the enacting of which they do
not directly or indirectly vote. The bounds of these
matters are nice, and hard to be settled in theory,
and perhaps they have been pushed too far. But
how they can avoid the necessary application of the
principles they use in their disputes with others to
their disputes with their fellow-citizens, I know not.
It is true, the words of this act do not create a
disability; but they clearly and evidently suppose it.
There are few Catholic freeholders to take the benefit
of the privilege, if they were permitted to partake it;
but the manner in which this very right in freeholders
at large is defended is not on the idea that the freeholders do really and truly represent the people, but that, all people being capable of obtaining freeholds,
all those who by their industry and sobriety merit
this privilege have the means of arriving at votes.
It is the same with the corporations.
The laws against foreign education are clearly the
very worst part of the old code. Besides your laity,
you have the succession of about four thousand clergymen to provide for. These, having no lucrative objects in prospect, are taken very much out of the
lower orders of the people. At home they have no
means whatsoever provided for their attaining a clerical education, or indeed any education at all. When I was in Paris, about seven years ago, I looked at
everything, and lived with every kind of people, as
well as my time admitted. I saw there the Irish college of the Lombard, which seemed to me a very good place of education, under excellent orders and regula
? ? ? ? AGAINST IRISH CATHOLICS. 227
tions, and under the government of a very prudent
and learned man (the late Dr. Kelly). This college was possessed of an annual fixed revenue of
more than a thousand pound a year, the greatest
part of which had arisen from the legacies and benefactions of persons educated in that college, and who had obtained promotions in France, from the emolument of which promotions they made this grateful return. One in particular I remember, to the amount
of ten thousand livres annually, as it is recorded on
the donor's monument in their chapel.
It has been the custom of poor persons in Ireland
to pick up such knowledge of the Latin tongue as,
under the general discouragements, and occasional
pursuits of magistracy, they were able to acquire;
and receiving orders at home, were sent abroad to
obtain a clerical education. By officiating in petty
chaplainships, and performing now and then certain
offices of religion for small gratuities, they received
the means of maintaining themselves until they were
able to complete their education. Through such difficulties and discouragements, many of them have arrived at a very considerable proficiency, so as to
be marked and distinguished abroad. These persons
afterwards, by being sunk in the most abject poverty,
despised and ill-treated by the higher orders among
Protestants, and not much better esteemed or treated even by the few persons of fortune of their own persuasion, and contracting the habits and ways of
thinking of the poor and uneducated, among whom
they were obliged to live, in a few years retained
little or no traces of the talents and acquirements
which distinguished them in the early periods of
their lives. Can we with justice cut them off from
? ? ? ? 228 ON THE PENAL LAWS
the use of places of education founded for the grealter part from the economy of poverty and exile, without providing something that is equivalent at bome' Whilst this'restraint of foreign and domestic education was part of an horrible and impious system of
servitude, the members were well fitted to the body.
To render men patient under a deprivation of all the
rights of human nature, everything which could give
them a knowledge or feeling of those rights was rationally forbidden. To render humanity fit to be insulted, it was fit that it should be degraded. But
when we profess to restore men to the capacity for
property, it is equally irrational and unjust to deny
them the power of improving their minds as well as
their fortunes. Indeed, I have ever thought the prohibition of the means of improving our rational nature to be the worst species of tyranny that the insolence and perverseness of mankind ever dared
to exercise. This goes to all men, in all situations,
to whom education can be denied.
Your Lordship mentions a proposal which came
from my friend, the Provost, whose benevolence and
enlarged spirit I am perfectly convinced of, - which
is, the proposal of erecting a few sizarships in the
college, for the education (I suppose) of Roman
Catholic clergymen. * He certainly meant it well;
but, coming from such a man as he is, it is a strong
instance of the danger of suffering any description
of men to fall into entire contempt. The charities
intended for them are not perceived to be fresh insults; and the true nature of their wants and necessities being unknown, remedies wholly unsuitable to
* It appears that Mr. Hutchinson meant this only as one of the
means for their relief in point of education.
? ? ? ? AGAINST IRISH CATHOLICS. 229
the nature of their complaint are provided for them.
It is to feed a sick Gentoo with beef broth, and to
foment his wounds with brandy. If the other parts
of the university were open to them, as well on the
foundation as otherwise, the offering of sizarships
would be a proportioned part of a general kindness.
But when everything liberal is withheld, and only
that which is servile is permitted, it is easy to conceive upon what footing they must be in such a
place.
Mr. Hutchinson must well know the regard and
honor I have for him; and hle cannot think my dissenting from him in this particular arises from a
disregard of his opinion: it onlly shows that I think
he has lived in Ireland. To have any respect for
the character and person of a Popish priest there -
oh,'t is an uphill work indeed! But until we come
to respect what stands in a respectable light with
others, we are very deficient in the temper which
qualifies us to make any laws and regulations about
themrn: it even disqualifies us fiom being charitable
to them with any effect or judgment.
When we are to provide for the education of any
body of men, we ought seriously to consider the particular functions they are to perform in life. A Roman Catholic clergyman is the minister of a very ritual religion, and by his profession subject to many
restraints. His life is a life full of strict observanlces; and his duties are of a laborious nature towards
himself, and of the highest possible trust towards
others. The duty of confession alone is sufficient
to set in the strongest light the necessity of his having an appropriated mode of education. The theological opinions and peculiar rites of one religion
? ? ? ? 230 ON THE PENAL LAWS
never can be properly taught in universities founded for the purposes and on the principles of another
which in many points are directly opposite. If a Roman Catholic clergyman, intended for celibacy and
the function of confession, is not strictly bred in a
seminary where these things are respected, inculcated, and enforced, as sacred, and not made the subject
of derision and obloquy, he will be ill fitted for the
former, and the latter will be indeed in his hands
a terrible instrument.
There is a great resemblance between the whole
frame and constitution of the Greek and Latin
Churches.
writings, it would be little worthy of our attention:
contemptible these writings are in every sense. But
they are not the cause, they are the disgusting symptoms of a frightful distemper. They are not otherwise of consequence than as they show the evil habit of the bodies from whence they come. In that light
the meanest of them is a serious thing. If, however,
I should underrate them, and if the truth is, that
they are not the result, but the cause, of the disorders
I speak of, surely those who circulate operative poisons, and give to whatever force they have by their
nature the further operation of their authority and
adoption, are to be censured, watched, and, if possible, repressed.
At what distance the direct danger from such factions may be it is not easy to fix. An adaptation of
circumstances to Ulesigns and principles is necessary.
But these cannot be wanting for any long time, in
the ordinary course of sublunary affairs. Great discontents frequently arise in the best constituted governments from causes which no human wisdom can foresee and no human power can prevent. They occur at uncertain periods, but at periods which are
not commonly far asunder. Governments of all kinds
are administered only by men; and great mistakes,
tending to inflame these discontents, may concur.
The indecision of those who happen to rule at the
critical time, their supine neglect, or their precipitate
and ill-judged attention, may aggravate the public
misfortunes. In such a state of things, the principles, now only sown, will shoot out and vegetate in
full luxuriance. In such circumstances the minds
of the people become sore and ulcerated. They are
put out of humor with all public men and all public
? ? ? ? 202 APPEAL FROM THE NEW
parties; they are fatigued with their dissensions;
they are irritated at their coalitions; they are made
easily to believe (what much pains are taken to make
them believe) that all oppositions are factious, and
all courtiers base and servile. From their disgust at
men, they are soon led to quarrel with their frame of
government, which they presume gives nourishment
to the vices, real or supposed, of those who administer in it. Mistaking malignity for sagacity, they
are soonl led to cast off all hope from a good administration of affairs, and come to think that all reformation depends, not on a change of actors, but upon an alteration in the machinery. Then will be felt
the full effect of encouraging doctrines which tend
to make the citizens despise their Constitution. Then
will be felt the plenitude of the mischief of teaching
the people to believe that all ancient institutions are
the results of ignorance, and that all prescriptive government is in its nature usurpation. Then will be
felt, in all its energy, the danger of encouraging a
spirit of litigation in persons of that immature and
imperfect state of knowledge which serves to render
them susceptible of doubts, but incapable of their
solution. Then will be felt, in all its aggravation,
the pernicious consequence of destroying all docility
in the minds of those who are not formed for finding
their own way in the labyrinths of political theory,
and are made to reject the clew and to disdain the
guide. Then will be felt, and too late will be acknowledged, the ruin which follows the disjoining of
religion from the state, the separation of morality
from policy, and the giving conscience no concern
and no coactive or coercive force in the most material of all the social ties, the principle of our obligations to government.
? ? ? ? TO THE OLD WHIGS. 203
I know, too, that, besides this vain, contradictory,
and self-destructive security which some men derive
from the habitual attachment of the people to this
Constitution, whilst they suffer it with a sort of sportive acquiescence to be brought into contempt before
their faces, they have other grounds for removing all
apprehension from their minds. They are of opinion
that there are too many men of great hereditary estates and influence in the kingdom to suffer the establishment of the levelling system which has taken place in France. This is very true, if, in order to
guide the power which now attends their property,
these men possess the wisdom which is involved in
early fear. But if, through a supine security, to which
such fortunes are peculiarly liable, they neglect the
use of their influence in the season of their power,
on the first derangement of society the nerves of
their strength will be cut. Their estates, instead of
being the means of their security, will become the
very causes of their danger. Instead of bestowing
influence, they will excite rapacity. They will be
looked to as a prey.
Such will be the impotent. condition of those men
of great hereditary estates, who indeed dislike the designs that are carried on, but whose dislike is rather
that of spectators than of parties that may be concerned in the catastrophe of the piece. But riches
do not in all cases secure even an inert and passive
resistance. There are always in that description men
whose fortunes, when their minds are once vitiated
by passion or by evil principle, are by no means a
security from their actually taking their part against
the public tranquillity. We see to what low and despicable passions of all kinds many men in that class
? ? ? ? 204 APPEAL FROM THE NEW
are ready to sacrifice the patrimonial estates which
might be perpetuated in their families with splendor,
and with the fame of hereditary benefactors to mankind, from generation to generation. Do we not see how lightly people treat their fortunes, when under
the influence of the passion of gaming? The game
of ambition or resentment will be played by many of
the rich and great as desperately, and with as much
blindness to the consequences, as ally other game.
Was he a man of no rank or fortune who first set
on foot the disturbances which have ruined France?
Passion blinded him to the consequences, so far as
they concerned himself; and as to the consequences
with regard to others, they were no part of his consideration, - nor ever will be with those who bear any resemblance to that virtuous patriot and lover of the
rights of man.
There is also a time of insecurity, when interests
of all sorts become objects of speculation. Then it
is that their very attachment to wealth and importance will induce several persons of opulence to list themselves and even to take a lead with the party
which they think most likely to prevail, in order to
obtain to themselves consideration in some new order or disorder of things. They may be led to act
in. this manner, that they may secure some portion
of their own property, and perhaps to become partakers of the spoil of their own order. Those who speculate on change always make a great number
among people of rank and fortune, as well as amongst
the low and the indigent.
What security against all this -- All human securities are liable to uncertainty. But if anything
bids fail for the prevention of so great a calamity,
? ? ? ? TO THE OLD WHIGS. 205
it must consist in the use of the ordinary means of
just influence inll society, whilst those means continue
unimpaired. The public judgment ought to receive
a proper direction. All weighty men may have their
share in so good a work. As yet, notwithstanding
the strutting and lying independence of a braggart
philosophy, Nature maintains her rights, and great
names have great prevalence. Two such men as Mr.
Pitt and Mr. Fox, adding to their authority in a point
in which they concur even by their disunion in everything else, might frown these wicked opinions out of
the kingdom. But if the influence of either of them,
or the influence of men like them, should, against
their serious intentions, be otherwise perverted, they
may countenance opinions which (as I have said before, and could wish over and over again to press)
they may in vain attempt to control. In their theory,
these doctrines admit no limit, no qualification whatsoever. No man can say how far he will go, who
joins with those who are avowedly going to the utmost extremities. What security is there for stopping short at all in these wild conceits? Why, neither more nor less than this,. - that the moral sentiments
of some few amongst them do put some check on
their savage theories. But let us take care. The
moral sentiments, so nearly connected with early prejudice as to be almost one and the same thing, will
assuredly not live long under a discipline which has
for its basis the destruction of all prejudices, and the
making the mind proof against all dread of consequences flowing from the pretended truths that are
taught by their philosophy.
In this school the moral sentiments must grow
weaker and weaker every day. The more cautious
? ? ? ? 206 APPEAL FROM THE NEW
of these teachers, in laying down their maxims, draw
as much of the conclusion as suits, not with their
premises, but with their policy. They trust the rest
to the sagacity of their pupils. Others, and these are
the most vaunted for their spirit, not only lay down
the same premises, but boldly draw the conclusions, to
the destruction of our whole Constitution in Church
and State. But are these conclusions truly drawn?
Yes, most certainly. -Their principles are wild and
wicked; but let justice be done even to frenzy and
villany. These teachers are perfectly systematic.
No man who assumes their grounds can tolerate
the British Constitution in Church or State. These
teachers profess to scorn all mediocrity,- to engage
for perfection, - to proceed by the simplest and shortest course. They build their politics, not on convenience, but on truth; and they profess to conduct men to certain happiness by the assertion of their
undoubted rights. With them there is no compromise All other governments are usurpations, which
justify and even demand resistance.
Their principles always go to the extreme. They
who go with the principles of the ancient Whigs,
which are those contained in Mr. Burke's book,
never can go too far. They may, indeed, stop short
of some hazardous and ambiguous excellence, which
they will be taught to postpone to any reasonable
degree of good they may actually possess. The
opinions maintained in that book never can lead to
an extreme, because their foundation is laid in an
opposition to extremes. The foundation of government is there laid, not in imaginary rights of men,
(which at best is a confusion of judicial with civil
principles,) but in political convenience, and in hu
? ? ? ? TO THE OLD WHIGS. 207
man nature, -either as that nature is universal, or
as it is modified by local habits and social aptitudes.
The foundation of government (those who have read
that book will rec6llect) is laid in a provision for our
wants and in a conformity to our duties: it is to purvey for the one, it is to enforce the other. These
doctrines do of themselves gravitate to a middle
point, or to some point near a middle. They suppose, indeed, a certain portion of liberty to be essential to all good government; but they infer that this liberty is to be blended into the government, to harmonize with its forms and its rules, and to be made
subordinate to its end. Those who are not with that
book are with its opposite; for there is no medium
besides the medium itself. That medium is not such
because it is found there, but it is found there because it is conformable to truth and Nature. In this
we do not follow the author, but we and the author
travel together upon the same safe and middle path.
The theory contained in his book is not to furnish
principles for making a new Constitution, but for
illustrating the principles of a Constitution already
made. It is a theory drawn from the fact of our
government. They who oppose it are bound to
show that his theory militates with that fact; otherwise, their quarrel is not with his book, but with the
Constitution of their country. The whole scheme of
our mixed Constitution is to prevent any one of its
principles from being carried as far as, taken by itself, and theoretically, it would go. Allow that to
be the true policy of the British system, then most
of the faults with which that system stands charged
will appear to be, not imperfections into which it has
inadvertently fallen, but excellencies which it has
? ? ? ? 208 APPEAL FROM THE NEW
studiously sought. To avoid the perfections of extreme, all its several parts are so constituted as not
alone to answer their own several ends, but also each
to limit and control the others; insomuch that, take
which of the principles you please, you will find its
operation checked and stopped at a certain point.
The whole movement stands still rather than that
any part should proceed beyond its boundary. From
thence it results that in the British Constitution
there is a perpetual treaty and compromise going
on, sometimes openly, sometimes with less observation. To him who contemplates the British Constitution, as to him who contemplates the subordinate material world, it will always be a matter of his most
curious investigation to discover the secret of this
mutual limitation.
Finita potestas denique cuique
Quanam sit ratione, atque alte terminus hxerens
They who have acted, as in France they have done,
upon a scheme wholly different, and who aim at the
abstract and unlimited perfection of power in the popular part, can be of no service to us in any of our
political arrangements. They who in their headlong
career have overpassed the goal can fiurnish no example to those who aim to go no further. The temerity of such speculators is no more an example than the timidity of others. The one sort scorns the right;
the other fears it; both miss it. But those who by
violence go beyond the barrier are without question
the most mischievous; because, to go beyond it, they
overturn and destroy it. To say they have spirit
is to say nothing in their praise. The untempered
spirit of madness, blindness, immorality, and impiety deserves no commendation. He that sets his
? ? ? ? TO THE OLD WHIGS. 209
house on fire because his fingers are frost-bitten
can never be a fit instructor in the method of providing our habitations with a cheerful and salutary warmth. We want no foreign examples to rekindle
in us the flame of liberty. The example of our own
ancestors is abundantly sufficient to maintain the
spirit of freedom in its full vigor, and to qualify it
in all its exertions. The example of a wise, moral,
well-natured, and well-tempered spirit of freedom is
that alone which can be useful to us, or in the least
degree reputable or safe. Our fabric is so constituted, one part of it bears so much on the other,
the parts are so made for one another, and for nothing else, that to introduce any foreign matter into it'
is to destroy it.
What has been said of the Roman Empire is at
least as true of the British Constitution: -" Octingentorum annorumrn fortuna disciplinaque compages hcec coaluit; quce convelli sine convellentium exitio non potest. " This British Constitution has not been struck out at an heat by a set of presumptuous men, like the
Assembly of pettifoggers run mad in Paris.
"'T is not the hasty product of a day,
But the well-ripened fruit of wise delay. "
It is the result of the thoughts of many minds in
many ages. It is no simple, no superficial thing,
nor to be estimated by superficial understandings.
An ignorant man, who is not fool enough to meddle
with his clock, is, however, sufficiently confident to
think he can safely take to pieces and put together,
at his pleasure, a moral machine of another guise,
importance, and complexity, composed of far other
wheels and springs and balances and counteracting
and cooperating powers. Men little think how imVOL. IV. 14
? ? ? ? 210 APPEAL FROM THE NEW
morally they act in rashly meddling with what they
do not understand. Their delusive good intention
is no sort of excuse for their presumption. They
who truly mean well must be fearful of acting ill.
The British Constitution may have its advantages
pointed out to wise and reflecting minds, but it is
of too high an order of excellence to be adapted to
those which are common. It takes in too many
views, it makes too many combinations, to be so
much as comprehended by shallow and superficial
understandings. Profound thinkers will know it in
its reason and spirit. The less inquiring will recognize it in their feelings and their experience. They
will thank God they have a standard, which, in the
most essential point of this great concern, will put
them on a par with the most wise and knowing.
If we'do not take to our aid the foregone studies
of men reputed intelligent and learned, we shall be
always beginners. But men must learn somewhere;
and the new teachers mean no more than what they
effect, as far as they succeed, - that is, to deprive
men of the benefit of the collected wisdom of mankind, and to make them blind disciples of their own particular presumption. Talk to these deluded creatures (all the disciples and most of the masters) who are taught to think themselves so newly fitted up
and furnished, and you will find nothing in their
houses but the refuse of Knaves' Acre, --nothing but
the rotten stuff, worn out in the service of delusion
and sedition in all ages, and which, being newly
furbished up, patched, and varnished, serves well. enough for those who, being unacquainted with the conflict which has always been maintained between
the sense and the nonsense of mankind, know noth
? ? ? ? TO THE OLD WHIGS. 211
ing of the former existence and the ancient refutation of the same follies. It is near two thousand
years since it has been observed that these devices
of ambition, avarice, and turbulence were antiquated. They are, indeed, the most ancient of all commonplaces: commonplaces sometimes of good and necessary causes; more frequently of the worst, but
which decide upon neither. Eadem semper causa,
libido et avaritia, et mutandarum rerum amor. C(eterum libertas et speciosa nomina pretexuntur; nee
quisquanz alienum servitium, et dominationerm sibi concupivit, ut non eadem ista vocabula usurparet.
Rational and experienced men tolerably well know,
and have always known, how to distinguish between
true and false liberty, and between the genuine adherence and the false pretence to what is true. But
none, except those who are profoundly studied, can
comprehend the elaborate contrivance of a fabric fitted to unite private and public liberty with public
force, with order, with peace, with justice, and, above
all, with the institutions formed for bestowing permanence and stability, through ages, upon this invaluable whole.
Place, for instance, before your eyes such a man
as Montesquieu. Think of a genius not born in
every country or every time: a man gifted by Nature with a penetrating, aquiline eye, - with a judgment prepared with the most extensive erudition, -- with an Herculean robustness of mind, and nerves not
to be broken with labor,- a man who could spend
twenty years in one pursuit. Think of a man like
the universal patriarch in Milton (who had drawn up
before him in his prophetic vision the whole series of
the generations which were to issue from his loins):
? ? ? ? 212 APPEAL FROM THE NEW
a man capable of placing in review, after having
brought together from the East, the West, the North,
and the South, from the coarseness of the rudest barbarism to the most refined and subtle civilization, all the schemes of government which had ever prevailed
amongst mankind, weighing, measuring, collating,
and comparing them all, joining fact with theory,
and calling into council, upon all this infinite assemblage of things, all the speculations which have fatigued the understandings of profound reasoners
in all times. Let us then consider, that all these
were but so many preparatory steps to qualify a
man, and such a man, tinctured with no national
prejudice, with no domestic affection, to admire, and
to hold out to the admiration of mankind, the Constitution of England. And shall we Englishmen revoke
to such a suit? Shall we, when so much more than
he has produced remains still to be understood and
admired, instead of keeping ourselves in the schools
of real science, choose for our teachers men incapable
of being taught, -whose only claim to know is, that
they have never doubted,- from whom we can learn
nothing but their own indocility, - who would teach
us to scorn what in the silence of our hearts we
ought to adore?
Different from them are all the great critics. They
have taught us one essential rule. I think the ex-. cellent and philosophic artist, a true judge, as well
as a perfect follower of Nature, Sir Joshua Reynolds,.
has somewhere applied it, or something like it, in his
own profession. It is this: that, if ever we should
find ourselves disposed not to admire those writers
or artists (Livy and Virgil, for instance, Raphael or
Michael Angelo) whom all the learned had admired,
? ? ? ? TO THE OLD WHIGS. 213
not to follow our own fancies, but to study them,
until we know how and what we ought to admire;
and if we cannot arrive at this combination of admiration with knowledge, rather to believe that we are
dull than that the rest of the world has been imposed on. It is as good a rule, at least, with regard
to this admired Constitution. We ought to understand it according to our measure, and to venerate
where we are not able presently to comprehend.
Such admirers were our fathers, to whom we owe
this splendid inheritance. Let us improve it with
zeal, but with fear.
Let us follow our ancestors,
men not without a rational, though without an exclusive confidence in themsel es,- who, by respecting
the reason of others, who, by looking backward as
well as forward, by the modesty as well as by the
energy of their niinds, went on insensibly drawing
this Constitution nearer and nearer to its perfection,
by never departing from its fundamental principles,
nor introducing any amendment which had not a
subsisting root in the laws, Constitution, and usages
of the kingdom. Let those who have the trust of
political or of natural authority ever keep watch
against the desperate enterprises of innovation: let
even their benevolence be fortified and armed. They
have before their eyes the example of a monarch insulted, degraded, confined, deposed; his family dispersed, scattered, imprisoned; his wife insulted to his face, like the vilest of the sex, by the vilest of
all populace; himself three times dragged by these
wretches in an infamous triumph; his children torn
from him, in violation of the first right of Nature,
and given into the tuition of the most desperate and
impious of the leaders of desperate and impious cl ubs;
? ? ? ? 214 APPEAL FROM THE NEW
his revenues dilapidated and plundered; his magistrates murdered; his clergy proscribed, persecuted, famished; his nobility degraded in their rank, undone in their fortunes, fugitives in their persons; his armies corrupted and ruined; his whole people impoverished, disunited, dissolved; whilst through the bars *of his prison, and amidst the bayonets of his
keepers, he hears the tumult of two conflicting factions, equally wicked and abandoned, who agree in principles, in dispositions, and in objects, but who
tear each other to pieces about the most effectual
means of obtaining their common end: the one contending to preserve for a while his name, and his person, the more easily to destroy the royal authority,
-the other clamoring to cut off the name, the person, and the monarchy together, by one sacrilegious execution. All this accumulation of calamity, the
greatest that ever fell upon one man, has fallen upon
his head, because he had left his virtues unguarded
by caution,- because he was not taught, that, where
power is concerned, he who will confer benefits must
take security against ingratitude.
I have stated the calamities which have fallen upon
a great prince and nation, because they were not
alarmed at the approach of danger, and because,
what commonly happens to men surprised, they lost
all resource when they were caught in it. When I
speak of danger, I certainly mean to address myself
to those who consider the prevalence of the new Whig
doctrines as an evil.
The Whigs of this day have before them, in this
Appeal, their constitutional ancestors; they have the
doctors of the modern school. They will choose for
themselves. The author of the Reflections has chosen
? ? ? ? TO THE OLD WHIGS. 215
for himself. If a new order is coming on, and all
the political opinions must pass away as dreams,
which our ancestors have worshipped as revelations,
I say for him, that he would rather be the last (as
certainly he is the least) of that race of men than
the first and greatest of those who have coined to
themselves Whig principles from a French die, unknown to the impress of oar fathers in the Constitiution.
? ? ? ? A
LETTER
TO
A PEER OF IRELAND
ON THE
PENAL LAWS AGAINST IRISH CATHOLICS,
PREVIOUS TO
THE LATE REPEAL OF A PART THEREOF IN
THE SESSION OF THE IRISH PARLIAMENT, HELD A. D. 1782.
? ? ? ? LETTER.
CHARLES STREET, LONDON, Feb. 21, 1782.
/[ LORD, -- I am obliged to your Lordship for. L71 your communication of the heads of Mr. Gardiner's bill. I had received it, in an earlier stage of
its progress, from Mr. Braughall; and I am still in
that gentleman's debt, as I have not made him the
proper return for the favor he has done me. Business, to which I was more immediately called, and
in which my sentiments had the weight of one vote,
occupied me every moment since I received his letter. This first morning which I can call my own I
give with great cheerfulness to the subject on which
your Lordship has done me the honor of desiring my
opinion.
I have read the heads of the bill, with the amend
ments. Your Lordship is too well acquainted with
men, and with affairs, to imagine that any true judgment can be formed on the value of a great measure
of pdlicy from the perusal of a piece of paper. At
present I am much in the dark with regard to the
state of the country which the intended law is to
be applied to. It is not easy for me to determine
whether or no it was wise (for the sake of expunging
the black letter of laws which, menacing as they
were in the language, were every day fading into disuse) solemnly to reaffirm the principles and to reenact the provisions of a code of statutes by which
? ? ? ? 220 ON THE PENAL LAWS
you are totally excluded from THE PRIVILEGES OF THE
COMMONWEALTH, from the highest to the lowest, from
the most material of the civil professions, from the
army, and even from education, where alone education is to be had. *
Whether this scheme of indulgence, grounded at
once on contempt and jealousy, has a tendency gradually to produce something better and more liberal, I
cannot tell, for want of having the actual map of the
country. If this should be the case, it was right in
you to accept it, such as it is. But if this should be
one of the experiments which have sometimes been
made before the temper of the nation was ripe for a
real reformation, I think it may possibly have ill effects, by disposing the penal matter in a more systematic order, and thereby fixing a permanent bar against any relief that is truly substantial. The
whole merit or demerit of the measure depends upon
the plans and dispositions of those by whom the act
was made, concurring with the general temper of the
Protestants of Ireland, and their aptitude to admit
in time of some part of that equality without which
you never can be FELLOW-CITIZENS. Of all this I am
wholly ignorant. All my correspondence with men
of public importance in Ireland has for some time
totally ceased. On the first bill for the relief of the
ROMAN CATHOLICS of Ireland, I was, without any call
of mine, consulted both on your side of the water
and on this. On the present occasion, I have not
heard a word from any man in office, and know as
* The sketch of the bill sent to Mr. Burke, along with the repeal
of some acts, reaffirmed many others in the penal code. It was al.
tered afterwards, and the clauses reaffirming the incapacities left out;
but they all still exist, and are in full force.
? ? ? ? AGAINST IRISH CATHOLICS. 221
little of the intentions of the British government as
I know of the temper of the Irish Parliament. I do
not find that any opposition was made by the principal persons of the minority in the House of Commons, or that any is apprehended from them in the House of Lords. The whole of the difficulty seems
to lie with the principal men in government, under
whose protection this bill is supposed to be brought
in. This violent opposition and cordial support, coming from one and the same quarter, appears to me
something mysterious, and hinders me from being
able to make any clear judgment of the merit of the
present measure, as compared with the actual state
of the country and the general views of government,
without which one can say nothing that may not be
very erroneous.
To look at the bill in the abstract, it is neither
more nor less than a renewed act of UNIVERSAL, UNMITIGATED, INDISPENSABLE, EXCEPTIONLESS DISQUALIFICATION.
One would imagine that a bill inflicting such a
multitude of incapacities had followed on the heels
of a conquest made by a very fierce enemy, under
the impression of recent animosity and resentment.
No man, on reading that bill, could imagine he was
reading an act of amnesty and indulgence, following
a recital of the good behavior of those who are the
objects of it, - which recital stood at the head of the
bill, as it was first introduced, but, I suppose for its
incongruity with the body of the piece, was afterwards
omitted. This I say on memory. It, however, still
recites the oath, and that Catholics ought to be considered as good and loyal subjects to his Majesty, his
crown and government. Then follows an universal
? ? ? ? 222 ON THE PENAL LAWS
exclusion of those GOOD and LOYAL subjects from
every (even the lowest) office of trust and profit, -
from any vote at an election, -- from any privilege
in a town corporate, - from being even a freeman of
such a corporation,- from serving on grand juries,
- from a vote at a vestry, - from having a gun in his
house, - from being a barrister, attorney, or solicitor,
&c. , &c. , &c.
This has surely much more the air of a table of
proscription than an act of grace. What must we
suppose the laws concerning those good subjects to
have been, of which this is a relaxation? I know
well that there is a cant language current, about the
difference between an exclusion from employments,
even to the most rigorous extent, and an exclusion
from the natural benefits arising from a man's own
industry. I allow, that, under some circumstances,
the difference is very material in point of justice, and
that there are considerations which may render it
advisable for a wise government to keep the leading
parts of every branch of civil and military administration in hands of the best trust; but a total exclusion from the commonwealth is a very different thing. When a government subsists (as governments formerly did) on an estate of its own, with but few and inconsiderable revenues drawn from the subject, then the few officers which existed in such establishments
were naturally at the disposal of that government,
which paid the salaries out of its own coffeirs: there
an exclusive preference could hardly merit the name
of proscription. Almost the whole produce of a man's
industry at that time remained in his own purse to
maintain his family. But times alter, and the whole
estate of government is from private contribution.
? ? ? ? AGAINST IRISH CATHOLICS. 223
When a very great portion of the labor of individuals goes to the state, and is by the state again refunded to individuals, through the medium of offices, and in this circuitous progress from the private to the
public, and from the public again to the private fiund,
the families from whom the revenue is taken are indemnified, and an equitable balance between the government and the subject is established. But if a great body of the people who contribute to this state
lottery are excluded fromn all the prizes, the stopping
the circulation with regard to them may be a most
cruel hardship, amounting in effect to being double
and treble taxed; and it will be felt as such to the
very quick, by all the families, high and low, of those
hundreds of thousands who are denied their chance
in the returned fruits of their own industry. This
is the thing meant by those who look upon the public
revenue only as a spoil, and will naturally wish to
have as few as possible concerned in the division of
the booty. If a state should be so unhappy as to
think it cannot subsist without such a barbarous proscription, the persons so proscribed ought to be indemnified by the remission of a large part of their taxes, by an immunity from the offices of public burden, and by an exemption from being pressed into
any military or naval service.
Common sense and common justice dictate this at
least, as some sort of compensation to a people for
their slavery. How many families are incapable of
existing, if the little offices of the revenue and little
military commissions are denied them! To deny
them at home, and to make the happiness of acquiring some of them somewhere else felony or high
treason, is a piece of cruelty, in which, till very late
? ? ? ? 224 ON THE PENAL LAWS
ly, I did not suppose this age capable of persisting.
Formerly a similarity of religion made a sort of country for a man in some quarter or other. A refugee
for religion was a protected character. Now the
reception is cold indeed; and therefore, as the asylum
abroad is destroyed, the hardship at home is doubled.
This hardship is the more intolerable because the
professions are shut up. The Church is so of course.
Much is to be said on that subject, in regard to them,
and to the Protestant Dissenters. But that is a chapter by itself. I am sure I wish well to that Church,
and think its ministers among the very best citizens
of your country. However, such as it is, a great walk
in life is forbidden ground to seventeen hundred
thousand of the inhabitants of Ireland. Why are
they excluded from the law? Do not they expend
money in their suits? Why may not they indemnify
themselves, by profiting, in the persons of some, for
the losses incurred by others? Why may not they
have persons of confidence, whom they may, if they
please, employ in the agency of their affairs? The
exclusion from the law, from grand juries, from sheriffships and under-sheriffships, as well as from freedom in any corporation, may subject them to dreadful hardships, as it may exclude them wholly from all
that is beneficial and expose them to all that is mischievous in a trial by jury. This was manifestly
within my own observation, for I was three times in
Ireland from the year 1760 to the year 1767, where
I had sufficient means of information concerning the
inhuman proceedings (among which were many cruel
murders, besides an infinity of outrages and oppressions unknown before in a civilized age) which prevailed during that period, in consequence of a pre
? ? ? ? AGAINST IRISH CATHOLICS. 225
tended conspiracy among Roman Catholics against the
king's government. I could dilate upon the mischiefs that may happen, from those which have happened, upon this head of disqualification, if it were at all necessary.
The head of exclusion from votes for members
of Parliament is closely connected with the former.
When you cast your eye on the statute-book, you
will see that no Catholic, even in the ferocious acts
of Queen Anne, was disabled from voting on account
of his religion. The only conditions required for
that privilege were the oaths of allegiance and abjuration, -both oaths relative to a civil concern.
Parliament has since added another oath of the same
kind; and yet a House of Commons, adding to the
securities of government in proportion as its danger
is confessedly lessened, and professing both confidence
and indulgence, in effect takes away the privilege left
by an act full of jealousy and professing persecution.
The. taking away of a vote is the taking away the
shield which the subject has, not only against the
oppression of power, but that worst of all oppressions,
the persecution of private society and private manners. No candidate for Parliamentary influence is
obliged to the least attention towards them, either
in cities or counties. On the contrary, if they should
become obnoxious to any bigoted or malignant people amongst whom they live, it will become the interest of those who court popular favor to use the numberless means which always reside in magistracy
and influence to oppress them. The proceedings in
a certain county in Munster, during the unfortunate
period I have mentioned, read a strong lecture on
VOL. IV. 15
? ? ? ? 226 ON THE PENAL LAWS
the cruelty of depriving men of that shield on account of their speculative opinions. The Protestants
of Ireland feel well and naturally on the hardship of
being bound by laws in the enacting of which they do
not directly or indirectly vote. The bounds of these
matters are nice, and hard to be settled in theory,
and perhaps they have been pushed too far. But
how they can avoid the necessary application of the
principles they use in their disputes with others to
their disputes with their fellow-citizens, I know not.
It is true, the words of this act do not create a
disability; but they clearly and evidently suppose it.
There are few Catholic freeholders to take the benefit
of the privilege, if they were permitted to partake it;
but the manner in which this very right in freeholders
at large is defended is not on the idea that the freeholders do really and truly represent the people, but that, all people being capable of obtaining freeholds,
all those who by their industry and sobriety merit
this privilege have the means of arriving at votes.
It is the same with the corporations.
The laws against foreign education are clearly the
very worst part of the old code. Besides your laity,
you have the succession of about four thousand clergymen to provide for. These, having no lucrative objects in prospect, are taken very much out of the
lower orders of the people. At home they have no
means whatsoever provided for their attaining a clerical education, or indeed any education at all. When I was in Paris, about seven years ago, I looked at
everything, and lived with every kind of people, as
well as my time admitted. I saw there the Irish college of the Lombard, which seemed to me a very good place of education, under excellent orders and regula
? ? ? ? AGAINST IRISH CATHOLICS. 227
tions, and under the government of a very prudent
and learned man (the late Dr. Kelly). This college was possessed of an annual fixed revenue of
more than a thousand pound a year, the greatest
part of which had arisen from the legacies and benefactions of persons educated in that college, and who had obtained promotions in France, from the emolument of which promotions they made this grateful return. One in particular I remember, to the amount
of ten thousand livres annually, as it is recorded on
the donor's monument in their chapel.
It has been the custom of poor persons in Ireland
to pick up such knowledge of the Latin tongue as,
under the general discouragements, and occasional
pursuits of magistracy, they were able to acquire;
and receiving orders at home, were sent abroad to
obtain a clerical education. By officiating in petty
chaplainships, and performing now and then certain
offices of religion for small gratuities, they received
the means of maintaining themselves until they were
able to complete their education. Through such difficulties and discouragements, many of them have arrived at a very considerable proficiency, so as to
be marked and distinguished abroad. These persons
afterwards, by being sunk in the most abject poverty,
despised and ill-treated by the higher orders among
Protestants, and not much better esteemed or treated even by the few persons of fortune of their own persuasion, and contracting the habits and ways of
thinking of the poor and uneducated, among whom
they were obliged to live, in a few years retained
little or no traces of the talents and acquirements
which distinguished them in the early periods of
their lives. Can we with justice cut them off from
? ? ? ? 228 ON THE PENAL LAWS
the use of places of education founded for the grealter part from the economy of poverty and exile, without providing something that is equivalent at bome' Whilst this'restraint of foreign and domestic education was part of an horrible and impious system of
servitude, the members were well fitted to the body.
To render men patient under a deprivation of all the
rights of human nature, everything which could give
them a knowledge or feeling of those rights was rationally forbidden. To render humanity fit to be insulted, it was fit that it should be degraded. But
when we profess to restore men to the capacity for
property, it is equally irrational and unjust to deny
them the power of improving their minds as well as
their fortunes. Indeed, I have ever thought the prohibition of the means of improving our rational nature to be the worst species of tyranny that the insolence and perverseness of mankind ever dared
to exercise. This goes to all men, in all situations,
to whom education can be denied.
Your Lordship mentions a proposal which came
from my friend, the Provost, whose benevolence and
enlarged spirit I am perfectly convinced of, - which
is, the proposal of erecting a few sizarships in the
college, for the education (I suppose) of Roman
Catholic clergymen. * He certainly meant it well;
but, coming from such a man as he is, it is a strong
instance of the danger of suffering any description
of men to fall into entire contempt. The charities
intended for them are not perceived to be fresh insults; and the true nature of their wants and necessities being unknown, remedies wholly unsuitable to
* It appears that Mr. Hutchinson meant this only as one of the
means for their relief in point of education.
? ? ? ? AGAINST IRISH CATHOLICS. 229
the nature of their complaint are provided for them.
It is to feed a sick Gentoo with beef broth, and to
foment his wounds with brandy. If the other parts
of the university were open to them, as well on the
foundation as otherwise, the offering of sizarships
would be a proportioned part of a general kindness.
But when everything liberal is withheld, and only
that which is servile is permitted, it is easy to conceive upon what footing they must be in such a
place.
Mr. Hutchinson must well know the regard and
honor I have for him; and hle cannot think my dissenting from him in this particular arises from a
disregard of his opinion: it onlly shows that I think
he has lived in Ireland. To have any respect for
the character and person of a Popish priest there -
oh,'t is an uphill work indeed! But until we come
to respect what stands in a respectable light with
others, we are very deficient in the temper which
qualifies us to make any laws and regulations about
themrn: it even disqualifies us fiom being charitable
to them with any effect or judgment.
When we are to provide for the education of any
body of men, we ought seriously to consider the particular functions they are to perform in life. A Roman Catholic clergyman is the minister of a very ritual religion, and by his profession subject to many
restraints. His life is a life full of strict observanlces; and his duties are of a laborious nature towards
himself, and of the highest possible trust towards
others. The duty of confession alone is sufficient
to set in the strongest light the necessity of his having an appropriated mode of education. The theological opinions and peculiar rites of one religion
? ? ? ? 230 ON THE PENAL LAWS
never can be properly taught in universities founded for the purposes and on the principles of another
which in many points are directly opposite. If a Roman Catholic clergyman, intended for celibacy and
the function of confession, is not strictly bred in a
seminary where these things are respected, inculcated, and enforced, as sacred, and not made the subject
of derision and obloquy, he will be ill fitted for the
former, and the latter will be indeed in his hands
a terrible instrument.
There is a great resemblance between the whole
frame and constitution of the Greek and Latin
Churches.
