monastic and conventual institutions requires to be revised. Roman Catholics have been subjected since the Reformation to many disabilities. It is true that many have been altered. It would require much study to show to what extent they have been repealed. The hesitation of Roman Catholics to come under the action of the Charity Commissioners is connected with this. All religions ought to be equally brought under the influence of the Charity Commissioners. It would be most desirable with this view to remove any disabilities which prevent such a course. Some disabilities which exist are vexatious, and ought to be removed. It would be wiser that there should be no difference as to the law of uses. As to praying for the dead being deemed a "superstitious use," witness would prefer that all the laws on that subject should be abolished, and that nothing should be legally deemed superstitious which does not violate the law of the land. How far

a bequest to secular priests is illegal he has some doubts. A case would be submitted before anything was done by the commissioners in such a state of circumstances.

:

As the blue book containing the evidence is not yet printed, we have quoted from the Tablet, and in some instances the writer of this article has given an account of what was said in evidence, from having himself been present. All condensed accounts give a very unfair and inaccurate impression of the nature of such evidence, chiefly because the question being suppressed, the answer often seems to come in apropos of nothing. Mr. Hobhouse, for instance, after saying that he wished the law which declares prayer for the dead to be repealed, adds:"Witness would not sanction legacies to a society of Thugs, though in the eyes of some that is a species of religion. Though witness does not agree with those who pray for the dead, still, as that violates no law, it ought to be a matter of perfect liberty." The writer was not present when Mr. Hobhouse gave his evidence, but he has little doubt that when the blue book is printed it will appear that he did not himself introduce the comparison between the Thugs and Catholics who pray for the souls of the departed, but that this was one of Mr. Newdegate's delicate little turns, and that he suggested that if Mr. Hobhouse's suggestion were adopted, the murders of the Thugs must be legalized as well as prayers for the dead.

We have quoted a good deal from Mr. Hobhouse's evidence because it shows how inconvenient the existing state of the law is felt to be by Protestant lawyers, who are anxious only to prevent jobs and abuses by which charitable endowments are diverted from their proper object. Several Catholic lawyers were examined. They all agree that the position of all Catholic foundations is unsafe, that men being professed members of religious orders are liable to banishment by the Emancipation Act of 1829. Nuns are not included under that

provision, but it is believed that the establishment of convents is still illegal under older Acts not yet fully repealed. It is illegal to give or leave money for "superstitious uses," and prayers for the faithful departed are held to be a "superstitious use." What the Catholic lawyers demand is, not that convents and monasteries should be made corporate bodies capable of holding property, suing and being sued, but that all laws with regard to them should be repealed, the effect of which would be that such communities would henceforth be regarded by the law merely as individuals living together, the law taking no cognisance of the fact that they chose to be subject to certain rules.

Should any Protestant object that unless something is done to prevent or limit it, property will accumulate in the hands of trustees for the support of religious houses, so that at length the whole soil of the island may be possessed by them, we may remark that that danger, alarming as it may be, is at least sufficiently remote. Mr. Harting (who is more likely than any one else to be correctly informed) gives evidence that the land now held for the use of nuns "amounts to 2 roods 34 perches for each nun," and he adds that if the whole soil of the island were equally divided among the whole population, each person would have about one acre and three-quarters; that is, each nun actually has a little more than a quarter of what she would have if the whole island were equally divided among all its inhabitants. A Protestant newspaper,* commenting on the first day's evidence, said, "Practically the law does not prevent the accumulation of wealth in Roman Catholic monasteries. It only prevents Protestants from knowing how vast are the sums bequeathed to them." This vague suspicion of the "vast wealth" possessed by Catholic institutions in England contrasts curiously enough with their extreme poverty, as proved by the evidence of really well-informed and trustworthy men; and the jealousy by which such estimates are dictated contrasts, if possible, still more curiously with the conduct of English Protestants towards the Protestant Episcopal communion in Ireland. Strikingly opposite as that body is in most respects to the Catholic Church in England, there is one respect in which they are alike, for each represents a small minority surrounded by an overwhelming majority of an opposite religion. The minority in Ireland, indeed, comprises nearly the whole wealth, and especially the landed property of the nation; while the minority in England consists almost exclusively of the poorest of the poor; and yet Parliament

*The Echo, May 26th.

unanimously voted to the Irish minority half a million sterling as compensation for the endowments which may have been made by private benefactors within the last 200 years, without even demanding any proof that they approached that sum; and although reminded by Mr. Gladstone, who made the proposal, that in fact those endowments were intended, not so much for the Protestant Episcopal sect as for the National Establishment, and that on this ground many endowments have actually been made by persons who did not themselves hold the doctrines of the sect now disestablished. It is in this spirit that the Parliament and the press of Great Britain deal with the Protestant minority in Ireland; nor, for our parts, do we grudge it. But we do complain of the striking contrast in their spirit the moment attention is turned towards the voluntary benefactions of private persons made (not two centuries ago, but in our own lifetime) to the religion of the Catholic minority in England. Instead of regarding them as so sacred that their application to the purpose intended by the donors must be scrupulously secured, even at the risk of sacrificing a great principle of extreme national importance, there is instantly displayed a morbid terror at the "vast wealth" so devoted, even when it is not nearly enough to supply to the women for whose maintenance it was given (women generally of delicate and often of luxurious training) the ordinary food of a peasant. Thousands are ready to demand that laws should be passed, not to secure the application of these funds to the purposes for which they were given, but to divert them from it, and especially to prevent any future endowments for the same objects. This is what most English Protestants think fair and equal dealing.

And yet, however much remains of the old anti-Catholic feeling, there are strong symptoms that any inquiry into the laws against the Catholic religion which still exist will be sure to compel even the most bigoted to abandon the defence of anything so disgraceful. For instance, on this subject, the same paper which we have just quoted, and which was one of Mr. Newdegate's strongest supporters, speaks as follows in discussing the laws denouncing prayers for the faithful departed as superstitious:-"Justice and expedience alike compel us to urge that no revision of the existing law of monastic property shall perpetuate the insulting spirit of the old legislation. Monasteries may or may not hereafter be authorized to hold property, and the tenure on which they may hold it will be limited as may seem best; but the absurdity of rendering legally invalid bequests for superstitious uses,' must at least be abolished For one portion of the community to pre sume to stigmatise the belief in the efficacy [of prayers for the

. .

dead] as superstitious' is a relic of the insolence of past ages of domination." It must grate strangely on Mr. Newdegate's soul to feel that it is the inquiry demanded by himself which has led to the formation and expression of opinions like this. One circumstance, indeed, he cannot but feel to be a triumph to him; it is that the Committee, instead of bringing its sittings to a close, has adjourned, to resume them next session. Thus Catholic institutions are still kept subject to a permanent inquisition, more resembling that system of inspection which he desires to establish than is at all just or fair. Meanwhile he, and such as he, are continually on the watch for any scandal, any quarrel in the Catholic body; or, on the other hand, for any popular excitement, any political change, which may give him the opportunity of inflicting a wound upon us. This is a state of uncertainty and insecurity to which, as peaceable British subjects, minding our own business, we ought not to be exposed. Until the Committee has made its report we cannot feel secure from his attacks. If (as we have every reason to expect) that report, when it appears, is framed in a just and fair spirit, such as Mr. Gladstone no doubt wishes, and if Parliament legislates in the same spirit, the result of Mr. Newdegate's movement will be all that Catholics desire, namely, that the law will place them for the future on terms of equality with their fellow-subjects-without injustice and without favour.

ART. II.-F. LOPEZ ON THE IRISH TRINITARIANS.

Noticias Historicas de las tres Florentissimas Provincias del celesto Orden de la Santissima Trinidad Redempcion de Cautivos en Inglaterra, Escocia, y Hybernia. Su author el M. R. P. M. Fr. DOMINGO LOPEZ. Madrid: 1714.

THE work whose title is at the head of this article contains information relative to the ecclesiastical history of Ireland which, if authentic, is so important, and its credibility has been so much disputed, that our readers will, we think, be interested in the results of a tolerably careful examination of the subject. On the one hand the author of the article in the DUBLIN REVIEW, April, 1865, evidently considers the statements of

Lopez to be unreliable; on the other, Doctor Moran, in his "Persecutions," quotes Lopez as a trustworthy authority. The Franciscan authoress of the "Illustrated History of Ireland" also quotes Lopez as reliable; but as she has evidently copied from Moran, and does not appear to have examined the book herself, this does not amount to a separate authority. We propose to give our readers a brief analysis of the book itself, and a résumé of the most remarkable points as regards its authenticity. The work is divided into nine books and an appendix. The first book gives an account of the first and subsequent Trinitarian foundations in England, Scotland, and Ireland. The second is devoted to the "martyrs of Great Britain (in which he includes Ireland) before the persecution of Henry VIII." The third contains an account of "the martyrs of England in the reign of Henry VIII."; the fourth, those of Ireland; the fifth, those of Scotland in the reign of Elizabeth; the sixth, lives of members of the order celebrated for holiness; the seventh, lives of Trinitarians, natives of Great Britain, who were cardinals, patriarchs, archbishops, and bishops; the eighth, Trinitarian writers; the ninth, other illustrious Trinitarians. The appendix refers to other provinces of the order.

Now, of these various subjects we are interested principally in those relating to Ireland, but, to judge the book fairly, it is necessary to examine also the other parts; indeed our readers will see presently that they afford the best means of testing its truthfulness.

First, with regard to the list of Irish Trinitarian cardinals, archbishops, and bishops, of whom Lopez enumerates two cardinal-archbishops and one cardinal-bishop, seven archbishops, and eight bishops; in all eighteen. It has been already urged that of all these the names only of two are to be found either in Ware or in any of the documents published by Theiner. This argument by itself, however, is by no means conclusive. Doctor Moran has pointed out that the catalogue of Ware is far from complete, and that he frequently assumes that one bishop, of whom he had discovered some record, lived until the date at which he found mention of another, and that he thus in some instances certainly omitted altogether a bishop who lived in the interval. It is, however, remarkable that no mention whatever should be found either in the documents published by Theiner, or in those discovered by Doctor Moran, or in our secular or ecclesiastical historians, of three cardinals and thirteen other bishops. But if we examine particular cases, the difficulty is much increased. According to Lopez, William Golding or Goold took the Trinitarian habit in the convent of Adare; studied and took the