advantages have been in their favour—they cannot say that any just means were denied them, or that any impro- per ones were employed against them. Yet the decision has been for the con- tinuance of the disabilities. If this decision had resulted from form and technicality, rather than evi- denca and deliberate judgment if it had been that of the Peers against the sense of the country, or of the Crown against the vote of Parliament if it had been in any way doubtful the Catholics might then have quarrelled with it, although it would then have been perfectly legal and constitutional. But what are the facts ? With regard to the nation, it is abundantly proved that the vast majority of all classes were against the Catholics ; with re- gard to the House of Commons, the actual majority was very small ; and the real majority, putting out of sight those who voted on grounds foreign to the merits of the question, was against them. With regard to the Peers, the majority against them was large, and perfectly free from suspicion of being obtained by undue means. With regard to the Ministry, one-half of it was against them. And with re- gard to the Crown, it is just as likely that its sentiments were against, as for, them. Again, to decide upon this question, our great political parties were dissol- ved for the moment. The influence of the Ministry was destroyed in effect, in and out of Parliament, for each half- neutralized that of the other. The in- fluence of the Crown, in so far as it was used, was vised by the Catholics and their friends in their favour. Now, granting it to be probable that this decision may have been an erro- neous one, who is to decide it to have been so, and to reverse it ? Where is the court of appeal ? In so far as the opinion of the nation goes, this opi- nion is decidedly in favour of the de- cision ; and there is no legal and con- stitutional authority in the realm that can take cognizance of the question, save the one by which the decision has been made. No matter how the Catholics may be aggrieved, there is nothing in the nation that can at pre- sent afford them a lawful remedy. There is no power here, or in any other part of the earth, that can com- pel the British people to change their opinions that can compel Lord Liverpool and his friends to support their claims that can compel the majority of the Peers to vote in their favour. They must be quite as well aware of this as ourselves.
What conduct, then, ought the Ca- tholics to pursue to do the best for their own interests? They should submit to the decision of Parliament and the country in a manner becoming good subjects. They should reform the ob- noxious parts of their conduct. They should abolish the objectionable laws of their church, and submit to be pla- ced on a level with the Protestants as a body. Instead of this, they are to reform and change nothing they are to array themselves as far as possible against the laws they are neaping the most foul and unwarrantable abuse upon all who have felt it to be their duty to oppose them. The reason is, because that is not done which is a downright, palpable impossibility. Do these people then seriously think that we are a nation to be driven from our opinions by their guilt and mad- n< ss ? Do they expect to compel our Peers to vote for them by sedition and slander ? Do they believe, that calum- niating such men as Lord Eldon, the Earl of Liverpool, and the Bishop of Chester, will gain our friendship ? Do they imagine, that the change of feel- ing which can alone remove the dis- abilities, is to be wrought among us by threat and insult by hatred and outrage ? If they d>, we will assure them they are mistaken we will as- sure them that they have formed a prodigiously erroneous estimate of our character. Alas ! Alas ! Is there not one Catholic in the whole body who is blessed with common sense, and who will step forward to save Catholic in- terests and hopes from utter ruin? O'Connell and the Catholics gene- rally, for reasons which may be easily imagined, discourse without ceasing in favour of liberty. The worthy counsellor, who led his mobs to crush as far as possible the religious and ci- vil liberty of the Irish Protestants, who declares that the. peasantry ought not to be suffered to read the Bible, to enter a Protestant place of worship, and to send their children to such schools as they may think fit who defends the detestable penal code of the Catholic Church, and who praises to the skies the conduct of the Catho- lic clergy of Spain and France, this
