tive religions, with full liberty to build churches, erect steeples, found schools, form church-yards, and so forth, without impcdiment". So much for religious toleration. Now for civil qualification. Thr edict proceeds to say, that "the public charges, offices, and honours, high or low, great and small, shall be given to native Hungarians who deserve well of their country, and who are competent to hold them, without any regard to their religious persuasion". This is the declaration of a Popish diet. This proceeds from one of those nations, which, according to the anti-Catholics, has no idea of toleration, as compared with this country! This Catholic government gives not only toleration, but qualification, and the Catholic Church acquiesces in the gift. We give toleration without qualification, and we accompany that toleration with pains and penalties. The anti-Catholic petitions require that those pains and penalties should be continued. The petitioners seem totally ignorant of the real state of things. They declare generally (mayors and corporations) that the principles of the Catholics are the same as they were at the worst of times. They state, and they state it after the demolition of the Vatican, after the prostration of the Inquisition, after the fall of the Pope, that religious toleration and civil qualification ought not to be granted, which is allowed in every great country in Europe, England excepted. They assume that to be true in argument which is false in fact. They quote Catholic writers, who have said that the fathers and they hold the same opinions; and on this the anti-Catholics found a monstrous misstatement.

Sir, the Catholics of the present day have evinced their principles by their oaths. They have abjured every criminal tenet attributed to their ancestors. In taking an oath framed by a Protestant, enacted by a Protestant parliament, and going into the minutiae of rejection, the Catholics have acquitted themselves, by a solemn obligation, of the principles formerly imputed to them. They, nevertheless, maintain, that there is no difference of opinion between them and their ancestors, because they maintain that their ancestors were charged unjustly with entertaining criminal opinions. This defence of their ancestors has been converted into a crimination of themselves, and they are suspected of maintaining doctrines, an adherence to which they deny on oath.

It is said by the anti-Catholics, that the Catholics have been, and are always the same. The Catholics allow, that a true Catholic was and is always the same; but they add, that a criminal Catholic is not a true one. "But the Catholics are enemies to the Church of England". Sir, this is a very hasty and imprudent assertion; it is

one calculated to make the Catholics that which they are not, enemies to the Church of England. If it proceeded from high authority, it night be seriously dangerous; but coming as it does from persons. however respectable, whose opinions are not entitled to very serious consideration, it may be comparatively innoxious. Sir, why should the Catholics be enemies of the Church of England? If the endeavours of the Catholic to obtain his civil liberties be opposed by the Church of England, then it is not the Catholic that is the enemy of the Church of England, but the Church of England that is the enemy of the Catholic. What is it, Sir, that is to make a Catholic an enemy to the Church of England? Is it his doctrines? Is it the doctrine of penance, of absolution, of extreme unction? The affirmative would subject the affirmer to the most just ridicule and scorn. So much for the hostility of the Catholics to the church.

But it is said further, "the Catholics are enemies to the state". Some honourable members on the other side of the House observed, that they were so "in principle". In principle! Sir, I deny it. How are principles to be ascertained but by actions? If they are enemies to the state, let us go into the committee, and let those who allege that the Catholics are enemies to the state, support their allegations by evidence. If they plead the canons of the council of Lateran, of Constance, of Trent, I will produce authority of a muci. higher description; I will adduce the testimony of the parliament of the united empire; I will quote the thanks of that parliament unanimously voted to the armies, of which a large component part was Catholic, for the most important service rendered to the state. Sir, the opponents of the Catholics go on to assert, that they are enemies to liberty. What! the authors of Magna Charta enemies to liberty! And have the Catholics shown no other attachment to liberty? I say that the very declaration of rights, which, on the motion of the right honourable gentleman opposite, was read by the clerk sufficiently shows the love of the Catholic to liberty. For wha does that declaration? It does not enact new laws, but it reaffirms those which the declarers found already established; and by whor were they established? Who were their authors? The Catholics, those alleged enemies of the church: those alleged enemies of the state; those alleged enemies of liberty! Why did the legislature, at the period of the Revolution, go further than to declare the law? Because the Roman Catholics had not only been friendly to liberty, but had so established the principles of liberty by statute, that the wisdom of the reformers could not exceed their distinct enact ments.

Sir, what is the amount of the charge now preferred against the Roman Catholics? That they are governed and swayed by all those canons which, they contend, have been grossly misinterpreted, but which, however interpreted, they have forsworn. They are accused of maintaining the deposing power of the Pope, of cherishing regicidal principles, and of asserting the right of perjury. On these assumptions, and in this enlightened age, the Catholic is not only not admitted to the constitution, but formally excluded from it. Sir, I defy those who are hostile to Catholic concession to support their positions by any thing but by these canons, nugatory, contemptible, obsolete, and denied by the Catholics themselves. What were the answers made by the universities of Salamanca, Paris, Alcala, Louvaine, Douay, and St. Omer's, to the questions put to them? [Here Mr. Grattan read the following questions proposed to those universities:]

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First, Has the Pope, or cardinals, or any body of men, or any individual of the Church of Rome, any civil authority, power, jurisdiction, or preeminence whatsoever, within the realm of England?

Second, Can the Pope, or cardinals, or any body of men, or any ndividual of the Church of Rome, absolve or dispense with his Majesty's subjects from their oath of allegiance, upon any pretext whatsoever?

“Third, Is there any principle in the tenets of the Catholic faith, by which Catholics may break faith with Protestants, or other persons differing from them in religious opinions, in any transaction, either of a public or a private nature?"

Sir, continued Mr. Grattan, on the best authorities, I can assert that those learned bodies were disposed, not to deny, but to ridicule the opinions imputed to them; not to reject, but to scorn them. They, however, answered, that the Pope had no such deposing power, and that, as to the supposition that the Catholics would keep no faith with Protestants, they were almost ashamed to say anything on the subject. Sir, a book has been alluded to, used by the students at Maynooth; and it has been adduced as decisive evidence, not only of the criminal principles of the Catholics, but as a proof of the criminal principles which the posterity of the existing Catholics were doomed to imbibe, by its being rendered available to the purpose of their education. These criminal principles are the authority of the Pope to depose royal authority, the consequent regicidal disposition of the Catholics, and the tenet that no faith is to be kept with heretics. The work I allude to, Sir, is called Tractatus de Ecclesia; and, with the permission of the House, I

will read several passages to show how baseless their assertions

are.

[The right honourable gentleman here read some extracts from the book in question. They stated that Christ had not granted to St. Peter direct or indirect power over the temporal concerns of kingdoms; that by the kings and emperors of states alone the supreme temporal establishment of them ought to be held; that the declarations of pontiffs were not to be considered as infallible, or as points of faith which it was necessary to salvation to believe.]

Here then, Sir, said Mr. Grattan, is a book which has been traduced as a concentration of evils, and it appears that it enjoins principles directly the reverse of those which have been ascribed to it. When such are the misrepresentations that are circulated, the result is not surprising. But there is another work of higher authority, to which I wish to refer. I mean the Common Prayer Book of the Catholics.

[The right honourable gentleman here quoted several passages from the Catholic Prayer Book, the tenor of which was, to declare that no general council, much less a papal consistory, had the power of deposing sovereigns, or absolving subjects from their alleigance; that the Pope had no authority, direct or indirect, over temporal affairs; that, notwithstanding any papal interference, all Catholic subjects were bound to defend their king and country at the hazard of their lives and fortunes, even against the Pope himself, should he invade their country; and that the alleged duty of Catholic subjects to murder their princes, if excommunicated for heresy, was impious and execrable, being contrary to all the known laws of God and nature.]

I have another instance with which I shall beg leave to trouble the House, and which would go to complete the chain of proofs that show the Catholics are not without principles of allegiance, and which would acquit them of every charge and imputation on their loyalty. It is the oath taken by the Catholics, according to the 33rd of the King, in Ireland, after the oath of allegiance.

"I, A. B., do hereby declare, that I do profess the Roman Catholic religion.

"I, A. B., do swear, that I do abjure, contemn, and detest, as anchristian and impious, the principle that it is lawful to murder, destroy, or any ways injure any person whatsoever, for or under pretence of being a heretic; and I do declare solemnly before God, that I believe that no act in itself unjust, immoral, or wicked, can ever be justified or excused by or under pretence or colour that it was done either for the good of the church or in obedience to any ecclesiastical power whatsoever: I also declare, that it is not an article of the Catholic

faith, neither am I thereby required to believe or profess, that the Pope is infallible, or that I am bound to obey any order in its own nature immoral, though the Pope, or any ecclesiastical power, should issue or direct such order; but, on the contrary, I hold that it would be sinful in me to pay any respect or obedience thereto : I further declare, that I do not believe that any sin whatever, committed by me, can be forgiven at the mere will of any Pope, or any person or persons whatsoever; but that sincere sorrow for past sins, a firm and sincere resolution to avoid future guilt, and to atone to God, are previous and indispensable requisites to establish a well-founded expectation of forgiveness; and that any person who receives absolution without those previous requisites, so far from obtaining thereby any remission of his sins, incurs the additional guilt of violating a sacrament: and I do swear, that I will defend, to the utmost of my power, the settlement and arrangement of property in this country as established by the laws now in being: I do hereby disclaim, disavow, and solemnly abjure any intention to subvert the present church establishment, for the purpose of substituting a Catholic establishment in its stead; and I do hereby solemnly swear, that I will not exercise any privilege to which I am or may become entitled, to disturb and weaken the Protestant religion and Protestant government in this kingdom. So help me God.

"I, A. B., do hereby declare, that I profess the Roman Catholic religion.

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'I, A. B., do sincerely promise and swear, that I will be faithful, and bear true allegiance to his Majesty King George the Third, and him will I defend to the utmost of my power, against all conspiracies and attempts whatsoever that shall be made against his person, crown, or dignity: and I will do my utmost endeavour to disclose and make known to his Majesty, his heirs and successors, all treasons and traitorous conspiracies which may be formed against him or them and I do faithfully promise to maintain, support, and defend, to the utmost of my power, the succession of the crown; which accession, by an act, entitled, 'An act for the further limitations che crown, and better securing the rights and liberties of the subject', is, and stands limited to the Princess Sophia, Electress and Duchess Dowager of Hanover, and the heirs of her body, being Protestants; hereby utterly renouncing and abjuring any obedience or allegiance unto any other person claiming or pretending a right to the crown of these realms and I do swear, that I do reject and detest, as an ancaristian and impious position, that it is lawful to murder or destroy any person or persons whatsoever, for, or under pretence of