State of Ireland
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really come to Parliament, help the judges in keeping order, and cultivate their lands properly. He had dissolved the Irish monasteries as he had dissolved the English, and had given their lands to these chiefs. He put down rebellious earls with a very strong hand, and quite successfully. He had taken the title of ‘King’ of Ireland. The ‘Reformation’ had been started in Ireland under Edward VI, but there had been little Reformation for Mary to suppress, and no ‘heretics’ were burned there. Certainly, until the middle of the sixteenth century, Ireland had shown little affection for Pope or Catholic faith. Catholic rebellionsBut rebellion in some shape remained the one thing that Irish chiefs loved, and it occurred to some of them, especially to one Shan O'Neill, early In the reign of Elizabeth, that a rebellion in the name of religion would be a much more successful affair than without that name: ‘England is now Protestant; therefore let Ireland rise for the Pope,’ was Shan’s idea. Philip of Spain saw a splendid chance (for the Pope and himself) of injuring Elizabeth by sending aid to Irish-Catholic rebellions; with Spanish aid.and, from 1570 at least, he continued to do so either secretly or openly until his death. The idea ‘caught on’, as we should say, with the whole Irish nation and every one went about shouting ‘Pope aboo’, ‘Spain aboo’, and ‘O'Neill (or Desmond, or some other wild earl) aboo’. Thus England, when she tried to keep order, always appeared to be ‘persecuting’ Catholics in Ireland. Colonies or ‘plantations’ in Ireland in sixteenth century.But Elizabeth could not face the frightful cost of keeping order there until the last two years of her reign, when she went to work in earnest and with some success. Usually she had preferred to plant ‘colonies’ of Englishmen upon some Irish districts which had been confiscated
