Edward Walsh that was insulted, but the Right Rev. Father in God, Edward, Bishop of Ossory: and it was in that capacity of Bishop that the offence was committed against him.

According, then, to the evidence of the canonists who have been examined here, the offence committed was of such a nature that there was nothing to incapacitate the Bishop from proceeding to inflict punishment for it upon the plaintiff. And that, certainly, would seem to be the proper and reasonable view of the case-always supposing, gentlemen, that there is such a law of ecclesiastical discipline as the law of which the witnesses for the defendant have given evidence, by which it is forbidden for a parish priest to implead his Bishop in the lay courts; but, of course, it is for you to say whether that ecclesiastical law exists or not. And I will here again state, that if there be such a law in the Roman Catholic Church, it must be recognised here: it is not void in the eyes of the law as against public policy, or the policy of the law, and it does not in any way conflict with the laws of this realm. Then it is objected by Father O'Keeffe that he received no citation. Well, gentlemen, to that it is replied that no citation was necessary, that it was not required by the Canon Law in such a case: it was a case in which, even if he were cited, he could have urged nothing that would have in any way extenuated or explained away the offence with which he was charged. In the action at law, which was in question, the plaintiff beyond all question, had brought the case into court; for he was nonsuited. I call attention to this, for it shows that the action failed in consequence of what was put before the court in the plaintiff's case.

This brings us to the end of the evidence produced for the defendant. And if you, gentlemen, believe that evidence to be true, it will indubitably be your duty to find a verdict for the defendant, on the plea of "justification." But if, on the other hand, you do not believe it to be true, if, after hearing all that evidence, you are of opinion that there was no breach of ecclesiastical discipline committed by Father O'Keeffe in impleading his Bishop in the civil courts, or that the Canon Law required that before being punished he should be brought to trial, or that the Bishop was not competent to inflict punishment on him at all, as being a judge in his own case, or that the Vicar-General was not authorized to inflict suspension in the absence of a special mandate; then, gentlemen, it will be your duty to find on this plea for the plaintiff.

And now, gentlemen, still confining our attention to this plea of "justification," we come to the evidence which has been given in sustainment of the plaintiff's case by Father OKeeffe himself. And in the first place I will take the liberty to say

that I have not the slightest fault to find with anything he said or did during the progress of the trial, nor do I think, gentlemen, that you have either. Sergeant Armstrong once or twice made a remark that some of the matters introduced by Father O'Keeffe were intended for the newspapers. Now, gentlemen, I will say that I think no learned counsel at the bar would have brought in half so little of what is intended merely for the newspapers--mere clap-trap-as Father O'Keeffe has done. Every counsel-and, of course, Father O'Keeffe must be looked upon as counsel here-feels himself at liberty now and then to bring in a little irrelevant matter, a few little flourishes, and all this is generally intended for the newspapers. But, as I have already said, I only wish that counsel would introduce as little of that sort of thing as Father O'Keeffe has done here. Whenever he introduced anything that was altogether irrelevant, I gave him my opinion that it was so; and he received every such suggestion, not only with propriety, but it is not too much to say-in a way that entitles him to my sincere thanks; for he yielded to the suggestions of the court with unvarying obedience, and with unfailing good temper.

He stated his case with great clearness, with great moderation, and with great propriety. He struggled manfully against adversity, in his attempt to prove publication of the libel. He bore his failure like a man. And when I suggested the course that he ought to pursue in the arrangement of his case, he at once adopted my suggestion. He cross-examined the witnesses for the defendant, with great learning, with great tact, with great ability, with great moderation. His own examinationso far as we can call it an examination, when a man simply gets into the witness-box and without anyone to question him, tells his own story-was gone through with commendable brevity and discretion. As to his speech in reply last evening, nobody could find the least fault with it; and I, for one, felt very much for him when, in his concluding words, he made his final appeal and laid his case before you like a gentleman and a Christian, asking you to do him justice.

To that, gentlemen, he is entitled at your hands. But, at the same time, remember that he can get only his legal rights when he comes into a court of law; and if the law does not, through you, sustain his case, he must bear his defeat like On the other hand, if the law does give him its support in the contest that he is waging here which is for him, in so many respects, an impar congressus-he must get from you that to which the law, as I will explain it to you, entitles him.

a man.

:

This, then, was his evidence :- "The Vicar-General was not competent to suspend me: he had no jurisdiction, no conten

tious jurisdiction: he cannot sit in judgment on another priest. The Bishop can delegate jurisdiction to him for that purpose. The Bishop did so, but it was a fortnight late; for it was a fortnight after the suspensions had been inflicted on me.

Besides, even if he were competent to try me, he could not proceed without a citation"—and you saw, gentlemen, the very learned and able way in which he managed the materials that were at his disposal on this point. Then, in reference to the alleged offence: "I was guilty," he says, "of no crime." He altogether denies, gentlemen, that there was any offence against the discipline of his Church in the action he took against the Bishop.

In answer to a question from me, he said: "I am a canonist learned in the Canon Law." And, gentlemen, I think we must take it that he is. He tells you that he had the advantage of being educated on the Dunboyne Establishment at Maynooth. I do not think, then, that anyone can say he is ignorant of the Canon Law.

Then he says, in regard to the Bishop's suspension : “It was of no validity. He, too, ought to have cited me. No man can be condemned without his own knowledge."

This is Father O'Keeffe's evidence, gentlemen, and if you believe it, you must find that the plea of "justification" has not been maintained.

Then, gentlemen, he seems to take a general exception to censures. The Bishop, he says, was bound by virtue of the contract entered into at ordination to provide him with means of support. As to his own share in that contract, he says, “I promised canonical obedience. I promised it; but I made no vow-that is done only by friars and monks." But, gentlemen, I must tell you, in point of law, that he is bound by his promise just as much as he would be by a vow.

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Perhaps the most curious point in the case is that which Dr. Walsh brought out so strongly in his evidence that Father O'Keeffe is thoroughly orthodox as a member of the Church of Rome. He fully accepts the decrees of the Vatican Council. He is not one of the people who call themselves Old Catholics. There is not the slightest aspersion on his orthodoxy, no more than on that of Cardinal Cullen himself. The learned men who were examined here have not said that he is anything else than orthodox. What they say is, that he is irregular and disobedient to the laws of his Church.

Then, gentlemen, with regard to the passages of the Canon Law which, as Dr. Walsh so plainly showed, authorize the infliction of punishment without any citation or formal trial, Father O'Keeffe says that these regard only cases where the person who is accused admits his guilt.

As to the offence in punishment for which he was suspended, he acknowledges that there are innumerable laws forbidding the impleading of ecclesiastics in the lay courts: but these, he says, are now at an end by disuse. And here, gentlemen, he makes an observation which is not perhaps without its weight. It refers rather to the way the case was put by his Eminence the Cardinal, than by Dr. M'Cabe and Dr. Walsh. "You say," replies Father O'Keeffe, "that because there are Bulls forbidding anyone to implead an ecclesiastic in the civil courts, I violated the law of the Church in doing so. But before producing these Bulls, you throw overboard a certain number of their provisions: you admit that it is lawful for a layman to implead an ecclesiastic: you admit that in matters which are not ecclesiastical, it is lawful for one ecclesiastic to implead another. For, so far, you say, those Bulls have gone into disuse. But what right have you to keep just so much of them as suits your purpose? I say that if any portion of the Bull has ceased to bind, the whole Bull must be given up."

That, gentlemen, is the way he puts his view regarding those Bulls. Then he goes on:- "There was no such law promulgated to me: it is not in the statutes of my diocese and they-the Statutes of Ossory-contain all my obligations." Well, gentlemen, I can only say that if that be so, whoever drew them up deserves no small credit for the brevity with which he has condensed them into so small a compass, and I only wish that we could secure his services to condense in the same way our Statute and Common Law, so that lawyers could carry it all about with them in a little book, like a prayer-book, in their pockets. It is for you, gentlemen, to say whether the statutes of a particular diocese, if they are silent on a particular point, thereby repeal it. And in considering this, you will not lose sight of what Cardinal Cullen said about the ten commandments, and about the inference that if Father O'Keeffe's view of the case were the correct one, he might go off and get married: and, as another witness—I think it was Dr. Walsh-put it, the Statutes of Ossory do not lay down the obligation either of reading the Office every day or of abstaining from meat on Fridays.

Then, gentlemen, when Father O'Keeffe had thus stated his own view of the case, I asked him—and I am sure he did not think, at least I hope he did not, that I wished to puzzle him by the question as he said that he had not been properly tried, what sort of trial would he himself suggest as satisfactory? Now, that, gentlemen, is the sort of question that although a witness is not exactly bound to answer it, yet a jury may fairly expect to have it answered. If a man tells

you that you are not on the right road, and if he can't tell you any other road to go, you had better, generally speaking, keep on the road where you are, and if he pertinaciously insist on your changing, he cannot complain, at all events, if you ask him to point out some better road for you to go.

In that way, then, I asked him: "How do you say that you ought to have been suspended-that is, of course, supposing that you were to be suspended at all? The Bishop, you say, was not the person to do it; for you contend that he was a judge in his own case: nor the Vicar-General; for you say that he had not the necessary jurisdiction." Well, gentlemen, he might have replied that the Archbishop of the provincehis Eminence the Cardinal-was the proper person. But he did not. And, in point of fact, when the Cardinal issued a suspension against him, he denied, as we know, the jurisdiction of His Eminence too. But, fortunately, gentlemen, we have nothing to do with that. The answer that Father O'Keeffe did give me was: "I will tell you how the Bishop ought to have acted. He ought to have written to Cardinal Barnabo, the Cardinal Prefect of the Propaganda, asking him to appoint a person to try me."

Now, gentlemen, a strange difficulty arises here. If the laws of the Catholic Church allow a suspension to be inflicted in the way that the Bishop and the Vicar-General issued their suspensions in this case, the law of the land will enforce that suspension. For there is nothing in all this procedure at variance in the slightest degree with the Common Law of England or of Ireland. And the law, dealing with the case as one of contract, will, if called upon, lend its aid to give effect to its provisions.

But the way that Father O'Keeffe now suggests, is declared both by the Statute and the Common Law to be illegal. That point has been decided by the judgment of the Queen's Bench in favour of the plaintiff, on the demurrer motion in the case of O'Keeffe v. Cardinal Cullen. For my own part, there is, I think a great deal of force in the view taken of that question by Mr. Justice O'Brien, who differed on this point from the three other judges of the court. But, of course, in saying this I hold myself free to form and to pronounce my opinion on it judicially, if the question should ever come before me as a judge in the Court of Error. I am here bound by the law as it stands, on the judgment which, up to this, has not been reversed-that any rescript sent from Rome by Cardinal Barnabo making any such appointment, is illegal.

The judgment of the court on that point is based on the Irish Statute of 2nd of Elizabeth, chap. Ist. the two objects of which are set forth in the preamble-to restore the