into temptation." The hand that holds her chalice should be pure, and the priests of her temple should be spotless as the vestments of their ministry. Rank only degrades, wealth only impoverishes, ornaments but disfigure her. I would have her pure, unpensioned, unstipendiary; she should rob the earth of nothing but its sorrows: a divine arch of promise, hér extremeties should rest on the horizon, and her span embrace the universe; but her only sustenance should be the tears that were exhaled and embellished by the sun-beam. Such is my idea of what religion ought to be. What would this bill make it? A mendicant of the Castle, a menial at the levee, its manual the red-book, its liturgy the pension list, its gospel the will of the minister! Methinks I see the stalled and fatted victim of its creation, cringing with a brute suppliancy through the venal mob of ministerial flatterers, crouching to the ephemeral idol of the day, and, like the devoted sacrifice of ancient heathenism, glorying in the garland that only decorates him for death! will read to you

the opinions of a celebrated Irishman, on the suggestion in his day, of a bill similar to that now proposed for our oppression. He was a man who added to the pride not merely of his country but of his species—a man who robed the very soul of inspiration in the splendours of a pure and overpowering eloquence. I allude to Mr. Burke-an authority at least to which the sticklers for establishments can offer no objection. "Before I had written thus far," says he, in his letter on the penal laws, "I heard of a scheme for giving to the Castle the patronage of the presiding members of the Catholic clergy. At first I could scarcely credit it,

for I believe it is the first time that the presentation to other people's alms has been desired in any country. Never were the members of one religious sect fit to appoint the pastors to another. It is a great deal to suppose that the present Castle would nominate bishops for the Roman church in Ireland, with a religious regard for its welfare. Perhaps they cannot, perhaps they dare not do it. But suppose them to be as well inclined, as I know that I am, to do the Catholics all kinds of justice, I declare I would not, if it were in my power, take that patronage on myself. I know I ought not to do it. I belong to another community; and it would be an intolerable usurpation in me, where I conferred no benefit, or even if I did confer temporal advantages. How can the Lord Lieutenant form the least judgment on their merits so as to decide which of the popish priests is fit to be a bishop? It cannot be. The idea is ridiculous. He will hand them over to Lords-Lieutenant of counties, justices of the peace, and others who, for the purpose of vexing and turning into derision this miserable people, will pick out the worst and most obnoxious they can find amongst the clergy to govern the rest. Whoever is complained against by his brother, will be considered as persecuted; whoever is censured by his superior, will be looked upon as oppressed; whoever is careless in his opinions, loose in his morals, will be called a liberal man, and will be supposed to have incurred hatred because he was not a bigot. Informers, tale-bearers, perverse and obstinate men, flatterers, who turn their back upon their flock, and court the Protestant gentlemen of their country, will be the objects of prefer

ment, and then I run no risk in foretelling, that whatever order, quiet, and morality you have in the country will be lost." Now, let me ask you, is it to such characters as those described by Burke, that you would delegate the influence imputed to your priesthood? Believe me, you would soon see them transferring their devotion from the CROSS to the CASTLE; wearing their sacred vestments but as a masquerade appendage, and, under the degraded passport of the Almighty's name, sharing the pleasures of the court, and the spoils of the people. When I say this, I am bound to add, and I do so from many proud and pleasing recollections, that I think the impression on the Catholic clergy of the present day would be late, and would be delible. But it is human nature. Rare are the instances in which a contact with the court has not been the beginning of corruption. The man of God is peculiarly disconnected with it. It directly violates his special mandate, who took his birth from the manger, and his disciples from the fishing-boat. JUDAS was the first who received the money of power, and it ended in the disgrace of his creed, and the death of his master. If I was a Catholic, I would peculiarly deprecate any interference with my priesthood. Indeed, I do not think, in any one respect in which we should wish to view the delegates of the Almighty, that, making fair allowances for human infirmity, they could be amended. The Catholic clergy of Ireland are rare examples of the doctrines they inculcate. Pious in their habits, almost primitive in their manners, they have no care but their flock-no study but their Gospel. It is not in the gaudy ring of courtly dissipation that you will find the MURRAYS, the Cop

PINGERS, and the MOXLANDS of the present day-not at the levee, or the lounge, or the election-riot No; you will find them wherever good is to be done or evil to be corrected-rearing their mitres in the van of misery,^ consoling the captive, reforming the convict, enriching the orphan; ornaments of this world, and emblems of a better: preaching their God through the practice of every virtue; monitors at the confessional, apostles in the pulpit, saints at the death-bed, holding the sacred water to the lip of sin, or pouring the redeeming unction on the agonies of despair. Oh, I would hold him little better than the Promethean robber, who would turn the fire of their eternal altar into the impure and perishable mass of this world's preferment. Better by far that the days of ancient barbarism should revive-better that your religion should again take refuge among the fastnesses of the mountain, and the solitude of the cavern-better that the rack of a murderous bigotry should again terminate the miseries of your priesthood, and that the gate of freedom should be only open to them through the gate of martyrdom, than they should gild their missals with the wages of a court, and expect their ecclesiastical promotion, not from their superior piety, but their comparative prostitution. But why this interference with your principles of conscience? Why is it that they will not erect your liberties save on the ruin of your temples? Why is it that in the day of peace they demand securities from a people who in the day of danger constituted their strength? When were they denied every security that was reasonable? Was it in 1776, when a cloud of enemies, hovering on our coast, saw every heart a shield,

and every hill a fortress? Did they want securities in Catholic Spain? Were they denied securities in Catholic Portugal? What is their security to day in Catholic Canada? Return-return to us our own glorious WELLINGTON, and tell incredulous England what was her security amid the lines of Torres Vedras, or on the summit of Barrossa! Rise, libelled martyrs of the Peninsula!-rise from your "gory bed," and give security for your childless parents! No, there is not a Catholic family in Ireland, that for the glory of Great Britain is not weeping over a child's, a brother's or a parent's grave, and yet still she clamours for securities! Oh, Prejudice, where is thy reason! Oh, Bigotry! where is thy blush! If ever there was an opportunity for England to combine gratitude with justice, and dignity with safety, it is the present. Now, when Irish blood has crimsoned the cross upon her naval flag, and an Irish hero strikes the harp to victory upon the summit of the Pyrenees. England-England! do not hesitate. This hour of triumph may be but the hour of trial; another season may see the splendid panorama of European vassalage, arrayed by your ruthless enemy, and glittering beneath the ruins of another capitolperhaps of LONDON. Who can say it? A few months since, Moscow stood as splendid as secure. Fair rose the morn on the patriarchal city-the empress of her nation, the queen of commerce, the sanctuary of strangers, her thousand spires pierced the very heavens, and her domes of gold reflected back the sun-beams. The spoiler came; he marked her for his victim; and, as if his very glance was destiny, even before the nightfall, with all her pomp, and wealth, and happiness, she