fion, with fome moral remarks, equally just and familiar, upon the hypocritical pretexts which ambition makes use of to cloke its wicked defigns. We have, then, a picture of the ftate of Ireland, which we cannot do better than quote, as a felicitous fpecimen of that terfenefs, rythmus, and epigrammatic force, which characterize Mr Gordon's style. In the perpetual fluctuation of power in Ireland, the nominal fovereignty had fallen from the houfe of O'Brien in Munster; and Turlogh O'Connor of Connaught, who had commenced his regal claims about the year 1130, was generally acknowledged prince paramount by the Irish chiefs. In this period the dominion of the O'Briens, who ruled in Thomond or North-Munfter, was contracted by the warlike fteps of Mac-Arthy, who exercifed an independent fway in Defmond or South-Munfter: the princes of Offory, Decies, and other territories of Leinfter, paid homage to Dermod Mac-Murchard as their provincial king: Meath was in fubjection to the family of Clan-Colman: in Ulfter O'Loghlan held the chief command: but his authority was difputed by Dunleve, prince of Doun or Uladh, who affected independence; and in the district of Breffnay reigned Tiernan O'Ruarc, a warlike chieftain.' 1. 66. Thefe dread fovereigns were, at the era of the English invafion, bufily signalizing their respective administrations, by hereditary acts of robbery, rape and murder. Such were the occupations of degenerate princes, whofe ancestors had doubtless, through long periods of refinement, often convened at the Fes of Tarah, and joined in claffic games upon the plains of Tuiltean. author gives a more fimple and perfpicuous account than is cuftomary with him, of the fituation in which Ireland was left by Henry, when haftily called away, to appeafe, by royal penance, the manes of Becket, and the wrath of Rome, we fhall extract it for the perufal of our readers. As the By the inftitutions of Henry, left fatally imperfect by unfeasonable interruption, the inhabitants of this ifland became feverally fubject to two very different forms of government; the British colonists to the Anglo-Norman, the ancient natives to the Irish, under a new fovereignty. The condition of the Irish princes, who had submitted, was no otherwife altered than that they profeffed allegiance to the King of England inftead of the King of Connaught. Their Brehon laws, their ancient customs, their modes of fucceffion, and their mutual wars, waged as it by independent potentates, remained as much in force after, as they had been before the English invafion. The British colonists, on the other hand, were in the fame political fituation with their fellow-fubjects. in England, and governed by English laws. The king, referving as his immediate property the maritime towns and fome diftricts, parcelled the reft of the furrendered lands among the leaders of his troops, which they were to poffefs by military tenure or feudal right, that is, bound to the the payment of homage to his majesty with a small tribute, and to the maintenance of certain numbers of knights and inferior foldiers for his fervice; they were otherwise each, in his own territory, abfolute and hereditary lords or princes. The territories aquired by himfelf and his British fubjects in Ireland were formed by Henry into fhires or counties, with sheriffs and other officers, on the English model; which counties, afterwards enlarged, formed what was called the English Pale, or that divifion of the island within which the English law was acknowledged. But even within the pale were many fepts of Irish, governed entirely by their ancient laws, as were the inhabitants of all other parts of the country. I. 108. The state of Ireland, for centuries after this period, can only be defcribed by words which exprefs whatever is moft lawless among men. History cannot light upon a more unpropitious period. We queftion if even the plaftic powers of a Robertfon could communicate any portion of intereft to the barbarous and defultory transactions of these times. When we have faid this, we need not talk of the execution of our good Irish rector. He would have acted more judiciously, both for himself and his reader, had he dwelt lefs upon events in themselves of little interest, and which he is fo little qualified to embellish. The proceedings within the English pale do not afford any grateful relief to the gloomy picture of Irifh barbarity. Struggling for existence amidst internal diffenfions, and preferved only by the divifions of the native Irish, the Anglo-Irifh government exhibits an odious mixture of debility and oppreffion, verifying the opinion of Burke, that English dominion had acquired its fpirit of hoftility to the Irish, before the diftinctions of Proteftant and Papist were known in the world. It is painful to reflect, that the acts and deeds of a barbarous fyftem, have too often found countenance in kindred proceedings of more enlightened times. * The glorious light of the reformation proved to Ireland only a fiery meteor, announcing a long track of future calamities. This people had truly fome little reason to demur, when their converted fovereigns came to demand acquiefcence in the new doctrines of religion. England had, among her earlieft acts, ordained a ftrict and lasting conformity with the Romifh church; fhe held a grant of Ireland from the Papal power, to which her fovereigns and parliaments had often appealed; and the now fought to overturn by force what the had herself established; and rebelled, as it might feem to them, against that fpiritual authority from which the had originally derived her own powers of fovereignty. The means which England employed to enlighten her Irifh fubH 4 *Letter to Sir Hercules Langrifhe jects jects upon thefe points, and to reclaim them from the errors of Catholic fuperftition, were certainly neither evangelical nor wife. Infulting the minifters and relics of a cherished religion, and perfecuting its believers by penal enactments, were not surely very perfuafive expedients, either to make converts to Proteftantifm, or willing fubjects to government. Nihil eft enim exitiofius civitatibus, nil tam contrarium juri et legibus, nihil minus civile. et humanum, quam compofita et conftituta Republica, quidquam agi per vim. Cic. de leg. The name of Sir John Perrot, one of the Irish governors of Queen Elizabeth, deferves particular notice and commendation in the hiftory of Ireland. Superior to mean prejudices, he took the old natives of the country under his efpecial protection; addreffed himself in a manner never attempted before to their generous feelings; and afpired, by mild, but vigorous measures, to bring the whole ifland, without diftinction of perfons, under one protecting conftitution. But this man, who fhewed himself capable of rebuilding a broken ftate, was foon compelled, by the oppofition of the English within the pale, and the want of fupport from his fovereign, to abandon his plans, and refign his authority into the hands of one (Fitzwilliam), as oppofite in principle, as he was inferior in capacity. We refer our readers to Leland, and other writers, for a full account of Perrot's fyftem and proceedings: meanwhile, we fhall extract the following brief notice of them from our author. The fcheme of Sir John Perrot was that alone, which, if carried into execution, could render this ifland an acquifition of any value to the English crown, or, indeed, prevent it from being a wasteful drain of blood and treasure from the English nation. By a fteady, ftrict and impartial execution, and gradual extenfion of English law, he wifhed to reduce all the inhabitants of the island into a state of uniform polity, reformation of manners, peace and profperity. Having published amhefty and affurance of protection to all who fhould return to their allegiance, and fent the fon of the deceased Earl of Defmond to England, to be rendered by education a fit object of royal favour, he proceeded to visit the feveral provinces, to prepare the way for the execution of his plan. Appointing fheriffs for the counties of Connaught, and marching to the north againft fome Scottish invaders, who fled to their fhips at his approach, he was attended with alacrity by the Irish chiefs of Ulfter, who teftified their wishes for the acceptance of English law, and agreed to the payment of an affeffment for the maintenance of eleven hundred foldiers without expenfe to the queen. For the carrying of his plan into effect, he petitioned the English government for the allowance of fifty thousand pounds a year during three years, reprefenting it as it really would have been, the cheapest purchase which England had made for a great length of time. His requeft was declined by the eco nomy nomy of Elizabeth, who was engaged in the affiftance of the Dutch in their war against Spain; and even the abfurd and pernicious jealoufy of fome, left the people of this island, no longer weakened and impoverished by inteftine wars, should become independent of the English crown. Only a fmall fum of money was granted by the queen, who had afterwards ample reafon to repent, as the fubfequent wars of Ireland, which would have been prevented, were the cause of a vast and grievous expenditure. p. 275-6. The Irish policy of Elizabeth, certainly contributes nothing to her reputation for wisdom and vigour; and in the regards which she bestowed upon her subjects in that country, there never was any great portion of tenderness. Her successor, James, had a passion for improving Ireland; but there was a large mixture of evil in his plans. The nature and tendency of his system of plantations, and other Irish measures, are by no means well delineated by this author. In his account of the great events of the succeeding reign, indeed of all that took place till the final settlement of the island by King William, when the history of Leland closes, our author invariably adopts the sentiments of that writer; sometimes making large quotations, and often borrowing, without any formal acknowledgment. Nothing that the author can call his own in the way of remark, or comment, or reflexion, once intervenes during this long and variegated portion of history, to mark the exercise of independent judgment. Nor is he by any means fortunate in the selection and disposition of the matter which he borrows; and some interesting pieces of information are either altogether omitted, or very inadequately given. Thus, for example, we have no distinct account of the extent and operation of the Catholic forfeitures, which effected such a signal, indeed unexampled revolution, in the landed property of Ireland. The act of settlement, we believe, transferred to English adventurers 7,800,000 acres; and the forfeitures, at the revolution, 1,060,793 acres. * By the victories of William, and the total loss of their possessions, the Catholics were thoroughly brought under the yoke; but the war of arms was succeeded by the war of penal statutes, in order the more completely to secure the prostration of these rebellious apostates. Under Queen Anne, the system of rigour and abasement received new refinements: indeed, to use the language of Burke, the severe and jealous policy of a conqueror in the crude settlement of his new acquisition, was strangely made a permanent rule for its future government, The author gives a very indistinct view of the provisions and principles of the penal code; and there is nothing of the spirit or philosophy of history See Plowden's Ireland, &c. in . in his feeble and scanty reflexions. Our readers know, that, soon after the revolution, the British Parliament began to assume the right of legislating for Ireland, and of forcibly interfering to restrain and regulate Irish industry. We quote the following passage to make our readers acquainted with the author's manner of thinking upon these subjects. • Since, from the final fubmiffion of the Irish to William the Third, in 1691, this island remained, above a century, free from other than external war, the hiftorian of this period has happily little else to record than Parliamentary transactions; but, unhappily, these were fometimes of fuch a nature as, more permanently than war, to fink the nation in poverty and barbarism. In the peaceful period, fince the furrendering of Limerick, this country has been of important fervice to her fifter kingdom, but of vaftly less than fhe would have been, if the English Parliament had acted towards her with a policy guided by common fenfe, or common juftice. The glorious revolution of 1688, which established in England an unparalleled fyftem of civil freedom, was far from extending the benignity of its influence in the fame degree to Ireland, where it only fecured the adminiftration of internal government exclufively to the Proteftant inhabitants, while thefe fame Proteftants, the conquerors, or the offspring of the conquerors of this country for the English Crown, were, in common with the Catholics, treated as a conquered people by the English Legislature, whose laws, with equal cruelty and impolicy, precluded them from availing themfelves of the fruits of their own industry. II. 184. The restraints, to which the author alludes, make, indeed, a long chapter in the history of Irish grievances. Previous to the restoration, we believe, the commercial privileges of the two countries stood on the same footing; but, soon after that period, it seems to have been discovered that the sister states had in this respect very opposite interests, and that the wealth and resources of the one would be greatly enlarged by diminishing those of the other. The restraining system was, as we have already said, grievously extended after the revolution, and continued in full force till the year 1779, when the spirit of the country, boldly and successfully exerted itself in procuring a material relaxation. By the articles of Union, many of the remaining restraints were at length removed, and the commerce of Ireland again replaced on a footing of equality and reciprocity. In the account here given of the reigns of George the First and Second, there is great lack both of matter and judgment; insomuch, that the author stoops from the dignity of history to to record political toasts, satires, and witticisms. Here, too, Lord Chesterfield's administration is made to introduce the subject of his letters; and we have the authority of the rector of Killegney to say, that this collection of paternal hortatives to fri 2 volity |