(says one of them), the whole of the letter is a "-marked censure and condemnation of the intemperate language and seditious conduct of the incendiary Catholic Board of Ireland, whilst it << conveys a most merited reproof of the sentiments << of the Irish Bishops, which have served so much << to encourage the mal-contents of that country in the prosecution of their wicked and alarming designs. From lamentable experience we know, that no writings can be too coarsely libidinous for the exhausted rake. So here we find no device, no invention, no dream too inordinate, base, or revolting, for feeding the saturated lust of a certain party for decrying and calumniating the loyalty and religion of the Irish. The English Journalists, one and all, became ravenous and rival contractors for the supply. The Morning Chronicle stood prominently forward on the list, as will be seen by the admission into its columns of the following egregious specimen of the pandering art*, equally remarkable for its stupidity and malice. A DREAM. I thought the Pope approached me in deep mourning, with but two of his triple crowns on his head. He wayed a wand, and immediately there stood before my eyes a huge body formed of a great mass of Irish Catholics without a head; its limbs seemed a good deal convulsed; and what should have been the heart, appeared in the likeness of a wooden clock, the wheels made of boards, and pendulum composed of brass. This aukward machine, by a complete intercommuni This *Morning Chronicle newspaper for 8th of July, 1814.very low, forced, and deleterious mixture, was administred by this Journalist within a fortnight of his rejection of my letter, in defence of a calumniated individual!!!! cation, regulated the motions of this immense frame, whose spasms seemed no longer unaccountable, from the nature of the impulse, which governed them. Behold, said the Pope, this heterogeneous figure. It is not Papist, because it denies my authority. It is not Roman Catholic, because it differs in the most essential point from those of that persuasion, who have in all countries yielded an interference in nomination to the supreme temporal authority. What it is I can scarcely tell, but what it will become, I have power to shew you. He then touched the great toe of the monster, with his wand, and the Dæmon of schism arose from the earth, riding on a hurricane, and immediately entering the belly of the body, raised the most violent commotion. One arm was strained into sedition, the other screwed down into fanaticism. One leg moved in the direction of the residence of the Lama, and the other bent its step towards the temple of Mecca. The stomach became excessively disordered by an influx of black bile, and the fumes of Methodism, Quakerism, Presbyterianism, and all the other isms issued from the passage through the neck in thick and lurid fumes; the wooden clock in the midst of this combustion crumbled into pieces, the board was consumed, the brass pendulum was melted, and under the ashes, the relicts of disappointed ambition, and selfish policy were alone discoverable. >> Apology is due to you, Sir John, and to all other readers of this letter, for having defiled it with a page of such nauseating stupidity. But as it contains hardly a word, which does not indicate low falsehood and elaborate malice, there was no possibility of conveying an adequate idea of the spirit and tendency of the composition by reference, analysis, or reflection. All would have been in credible as would also be the impudent and inconsistent falsities, with which the party ushered into public the arrival of the magic piece of mechanism, which had returned to its original manufactory on the 28th of April, 1814, polished, clothed, and accredited with the art, costume, and authenticity of the Curia Romana. It arrived at No. 4, Castle-street, Holborn, in London (the residence of the Vicar Apostolic), and was there delivered to him to whom it is addressed, by his faithful agent, who had closely watched it through every stage of its progress at Rome, from its rude British substance, to the last stroke of that exquisite workmanship of the Roman model, in which it re-appeared in London. Nothing short of the last glimmer of dotage or the earliest dawn of puerility, could suggest, that within three days of the arrival of the rare and precious document, its contents could have become known to the different Editors of the London Journals, otherwise than through the party, who had precipitated its progress thro' all the official ceremonies of the Court of Rome with unprecedented velocity, and whose leaders were then the sole depositaries of the momentous record. I wish not to extend my observations beyond the necessity of placing every circumstance touching the important subject in broad day-light: and you will allow me, Sir John, to term that subject important, which intimately involves the religious freedom of six millions of his Majesty's subjects, throughout the whole extent of the British Empire, and which in open Senate, in 1813, you, Sir John Cox Hippisley, scrupled not to declare*, you had been labouring eight years in enquiries upon. * Hist. Let. to Sir J. C. Hippisley, p. 126. To you, Sir John, as a Brother Barrister, and as the learned Recorder of Sudbury, it will not appear pedantic to refer to the old adage, Qui facit per alium, facit per se. The attempts to pre-engage the first impressions of the public, through stipendiary Journalists, are obviously traced to that source, from which alone information was to be derived as to the existence, arrival, or contents of the mysterious document. Little time was lost in preparing the Pilot newspaper (generally deemed favourable to the Catholic Cause), to announce on the 30th of April, the following false statement of the recent arrival from Rome. << We have just « heard, from unquestionable authority, that the «< first act of the Pope on his re-establishment at «Rome, was to pass in full consistory, with all the Cardinals unanimously agreeing, an arrange«ment giving to the British Crown the desired security, respecting the nomination of the Catholic Bishops. We are assured, that special instruc<tions to this effect have been dispatched by his << Holiness to all the Catholic Prelates in the British Empire. This first annunciation in a favorite newspaper bespoke the very quintescence of the spirit, views, and intentions of the devisers, modellers, and procurers of the rescript. The three days immediately following the arrival of the rare exotic were not spent in idleness; the prefigured triumph was followed up with all the wonted industry of the party. The Roman instrument was committed to the English press, and made its public appearance in the British metropolis in a folio and quarto edition: it was translated into English for the benefit of the unlearned, and published in the leading London Journals, subscribed agreeable to the original, Joseph Hodgson, V. G. On the second day of May, copies of it were sent in circulars to " : the whole Irish Hierarchy from Dr. Poynter and on the same day appeared in the Sun newspaper in London, an elaborate and very unfaithful analysis of it, still striving to rivet the first impressions of the public, by the notorious and rank falsehood, that this was the first act of authority, which was exercised by the venerable Pontiff, after he was «released from his oppressed and lamentable captivity." On the same 2d day of May, the Morning Chronicle brought forth an untimely, hard-laboured epitome of the Vice-President's letter, before it had appeared in public, and which had been furnished by the holders of the original, with the like strained construction, or rather wanton assumption, that his Holiness found « the Veto proposed to be given to the King of Great Britain in the appointment of Bishops and Deans in his « dominions, was strictly conformable to the rules and practice of the Holy See, and would be cordially acceded to, and acted upon by the Sovereign Pontiff in all time to come: and also, that all correspondence between Roman Catholics «and the Holy See should in future be subject to such inspection and controul, as was proposed by the late Catholic Relief Bill, the whole of which is highly applauded *. " .» *I have been, perhaps, redundantly anxious to place before the public, the inexorable perseverance of the party in forcing into circulation (always without name or responsibility), fiction, falsehood and calumny, to serve their ends. From the first dawn of the rescript, the Journals, which vied with each, other iu prostituting their sheets to the intrigues of the party, were fed with such coarse, revolting, and malicious untruths concerning it, that if brought together would form such an exquisite specimen of the craft, as to entitle the purveyors of the articles to the first Quesnellian prize for the running century. The following compound of improbability, untruth |