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Is Ulster Right

19 of 95

CHAPTER V. THE PERIOD OF THE PENAL LAWS. The flight of James II brings us to the era of the "penal laws." To one who lives in the twentieth century and is embued with the spirit of modern thought, the whole subject is more than painful--it is detestable. But to pass it over in silence is impossible; and in order to get a clear view of the position it is necessary to examine what the penal laws were, what they were not, and what were the circumstances of the time during which they were in force. The penal laws were a series of enactments carefully planned so as to harass the Roman Catholics at every moment of their lives, in the hope of inducing them to abandon their religion. The unhappy people were prohibited from becoming or voting for members of Parliament; they were excluded from corporations, the army, the navy and the legal profession. They were forbidden to bear arms, or even to possess a horse worth more than 5. Education was denied to them, as they could not send their sons to the university and were forbidden either to have schools of their own in Ireland or to send their children abroad. They were not allowed to possess freehold estates in land, and even as to leaseholds they were seriously restricted. On the death of a Roman Catholic his estate was divided amongst his children equally, unless the eldest son became a Protestant, in which case he inherited the whole. And as no Roman Catholic was allowed to act as a guardian, a man never knew that if he should die his children might not be brought up in a faith that he detested. The performance of Roman Catholic worship was barely tolerated, as no bishops or other dignitaries were allowed to remain in Ireland, and the only priests authorized to say mass were those who were "registered" and had taken the oath of abjuration--that is, an oath declaring that the Pretender had no right to the throne. Such in brief were those terrible statutes. But without attempting to excuse them, there are various matters which must be taken into account if we are to judge them fairly. In the first place, the political aspect of the question should not be forgotten. The Protestant minority might justly fear that if the Roman Catholic party were as powerful as their numbers would naturally cause them to be, they would aid in bringing about a French invasion for the restoration of the Stuarts and the re-establishment of the system which had been in evidence under James II. An army was actually formed in France, and on more than one occasion was in readiness to start. The Stuarts were regarded by the Pope as the rightful sovereigns. The Roman Catholic prelates whose entry into Ireland was forbidden were appointed by the Pretender and were his political agents; it was that fact, and no doctrinal reason, that caused their expulsion. It is necessary to make this quite clear, as there has been as much exaggeration on this point as on most other subjects connected with Irish history. The words of the "oath of abjuration" were as follows: "I do solemnly and sincerely declare that I do believe in my conscience that the person pretended to be Prince of Wales during the life of the late King James and since his decease taking upon himself the style and title of King of England by the name of James III hath not any right or title whatever to the crown of this realm." A modern Roman Catholic writer has thus described the oath:-- "By the Oath of Abjuration the priest was ordered to swear that the sacrifice of the mass and the invocation of the Blessed Virgin and the saints were damnable and idolatrous. In other words, the priest was ordered to apostatize, or fly for his life." And even if Roman Catholics took the oath of allegiance, the old difficulty arose as to the papal right to depose princes and to order their subjects to rebel. So late as 1768, when a declaration was drawn up which it was hoped the leaders of the Roman Catholic party would sign, so that the penal laws might be finally done away with, the Papal Nuncio vetoed the proposal because the declaration contained a reprobation of the doctrines that faith need not be kept with heretics

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