"My dearest joy, "Thou mayest see by my delay in writing that I am not willing to write while things are in these conditions. But shall we receive good at the hands of God, and shall we not receive ill? He gives and takes away, blessed be his holy name! I have been near a fortnight at the black rod, charged with a treason. Never any man was more innocent of that foul crime: the ground is only my reservedness. God in his mercy, I do not doubt, will send us many merry and happy days together after this, when this storm is blown over. But this is a time of humiliation for the present. By all the love between us, I require thee that thou do not cast down thyself, but bear it with a cheerful mind, and trust in God that He will deliver us'." Rebellion of 1641. Previous general tranquillity. SECTION IX. Rebellion of 1641. Previous circumstances. Its objects. THE thunder-storm, to which the biographer of At the period preceding the year 1641, there appears to have been a general tranquillity throughout the kingdom, unless where it was molested by the Scotch innovators, and a general good agreement between the Irish and English inhabitants. The two nations had lived together for many successive years in security and comfort, and with a 9 Rawdon Papers, p. 75. mutual interchange of friendly offices. Their intermarriages were frequent, their manners had acquired a great degree of similarity, and there was much probability in the prospect of a long endurance of peace and good-will. the Popish reli In particular, the Papists were enjoying the free Free exercise of exercise of their religion. By the excessive indul- gion. gence of the late governments, their titular archbishops, bishops, vicars-general, provincial consistories, deans, abbots, priors, and nuns, all lived unrestrainedly, if somewhat covertly, amongst them; and exercised over them an uncontrolled and voluntary jurisdiction. Their priests, jesuits, and friars, had of late years exceedingly multiplied; and returned in vast numbers from Italy, Spain, and other foreign countries, whither the children of the native Irish, who were devoted to the sacred profession, were usually sent for education. These, without interruption, had quietly settled themselves in the chief towns and villages, as well as in the houses of the noblemen and private gentlemen throughout the kingdom: so that, notwithstanding any penalties which they might have suffered from a strict enforcement of the laws, they were allowed in fact the private, but undisturbed, exercise of all their religious rites and ceremonies. lion and massacre. It was under such circumstances as these, that Plot for Rebelfor several years a deep plot was laid for a general Rebellion, and massacre of the English and Protestant inhabitants, by Popish priests and jesuits of the Continent, in conjunction with those of Ireland. For carrying it into execution, they were accustomed in their publick devotions to recommend the good success of a great design, calculated to promote the prosperity of the kingdom and the advancement of Its religious motives. Sccular motives. Encouragement of the people by the priests. Objects of the the Catholick cause. For exciting the people to accomplish the undertaking with greater animation, they loudly declaimed everywhere against Englishmen and Protestants, impressing on the people that to kill a heretick was no more sinful than to kill a dog, but that to relieve or protect one would be an unpardonable sin. They represented also most invidiously the severe courses taken by the English Parliament for suppressing the Romish religion: and they most falsely invented a story of a secret conspiracy for seizing the principal Irish noblemen and gentlemen of that persuasion, in the ensuing November, and compelling them, under the dread of a general massacre, to embrace the Protestant faith®. Together with these religious motives to animosity, they combined others of a secular kind. The prosperity of the English settlers; their large possessions and goodly improvements; the English property in the soil withdrawn from themselves, the ancient proprietors, and only true owners, as they esteemed themselves, whose present condition was in comparison one of extreme degradation and wretchedness; were additional motives to animosity and hostility. Add to these the liberty, given by the priests to the people, upon dismissing them at mass on the eve of the Rebellion, to go forth, and take possession of all their lands, which were unjustly detained by the English; and to plunder, strip, and despoil the invaders of all their cattle and goods. And surely the incentive must have been powerful, to prompt a whole nation, as it were, to do despite to our common nature; and to cast from them all the feelings of humanity; and to combine together, for the purpose of involving all the English, man, woman, and child, old and young, in one sweeping destruction, and thus extirpate them utterly from the country. Oct. 23, 1641. Such, however, was the purpose, and such the Its explosion, attempt, of that barbarous massacre, which, having been plotted with jesuitical malignity and artifice, and carried forward to the period of its consummation with secresy the most marvellous, at length, on the 23rd of October, 1641, suddenly burst forth and filled large districts of Ireland, more especially in the northern counties, with human sacrifices, so that "the land was defiled with blood." portunity. The period was especially favourable to the Seasonable openterprise by reason of the difficulties and dangers which pre-occupied and beset the government in the other parts of the empire. This sentiment is strongly put forward by Dean Swift, in his sermon on the martyrdom of King Charles the First. "The Irish rebellion was wholly owing to that wicked English Parliament. For the leaders in the Irish Popish massacre would never have dared to stir a finger, if they had not been encouraged by that rebellious spirit in the English House of Commons, which they very well knew must disable the king from sending any supplies to his Protestant subjects here: and, therefore, we may truly say, that the English Parliament held the king's hands, while the Irish Papists here were cutting our grandfathers' throats." ties. The detail of horrible atrocities, which were then Horrible atroci perpetrated, is too painful to be needlessly contemplated: and it is not intended in the present pages to offer them to the reader's observation. They may 2 SWIFT's Works, v. ix. p. 179. Its effects on the Ruin of her sacred edifices. Instances of plunder and sacrilege. be found by those who seek them, in the histories of The savage, panting under Indian skies, Our more immediate business, however, with this nefarious conspiracy is to regard it in its effects upon the Church of Ireland, to the well-being of which, and even to its very being, in many parts of the kingdom, it must for a time have been fatal. In numerous instances no doubt the Church was despoiled of her sacred edifices for divine worship. When we read that "the cathedral church and town of Armagh were burnt, many towns laid waste, all the fair plantations made by the British left desolate," and that fire was one of the instruments of this general waste and desolation, we can hardly refrain from the inference, that other churches were involved in a similar fate to that which destroyed the cathedral of Armagh; and it is but reasonable to suppose, that in other cases the like result would follow from that spirit of plunder and sacrilege, which "forcibly broke open the doors of the cathedral church of Kilkenny; and plundered it of its property there deposited, its chalices, surplices, ornaments, books, records, and writings;" whilst "the general remonstrance of the distressed Protestants in the province of Munster," pouring forth 3 RICHARDS's Modern France. |