this hour for leave to look into a Bible, for leave to look into any book with out the intervention of a priest, for leave to eat our bread in peace, without the permission of a priest ordain ing what we shall eat, and whether we shall eat at all; for leave to sleep at night in our beds, without the terror of being dragged from them by some officer of a tribunal of blood, some familiar of the Inquisition, to die under the torture, or linger out a miserable life in a dungeon! The men to whom we are at this hour indebted, that England is the head of the civilized world, and not the vassal of France and Spain, and like them both in inse curity and public distrust, with an unsettled throne, and a people ready for mutual massacre.

The memory of Elizabeth, the greatest queen that ever ruled a nation, a mind thoroughly English, the bulwark of freedom not merely among ourselves, but of whatever civil and religious freedom existed in Europe, is the chief subject of contumely to this unnational and perfidious histo

rian.

He charges Elizabeth with persecution! The slaughter of heretics is the notorious tenet of his own church; authenticated in every age, and at this hour ready to be put in force, if our weakness, or our belief in their protestations, give them the mastery. The charge is altogether false-she persecuted none! Religious opinions brought no priest to the scaffold. But justice and the public safety demanded that the hired agents of Spain and France, and the declared conspirators against her life, and the liberties of England, should not be suffered to involve the land in bloodshed and convulsion. Yet, with all this provocation, but few died; and none but by a public trial, on unquestioned proof of guilt. They perished as traitors, detected in their treason! The reign of Elizabeth was the crisis of the great struggle of false religion with true, of despotism with liberty, of national debasement, misery, and anarchy, with national empire, happiness, and order.

What was her history?

Elizabeth came to the throne in 1558. She found popish Europe triumphing in the prospect of the subversion of British power, as it had already exulted over the prostration of religion in the blood of her people.

The first act of popery was the type of all that followed; the whole body of the popish prelates of England, with one exception, refused to crown her.

The vassalage of England was the object of France. It was hoped to become an easier prey, if Mary of Scotland was queen. France notoriously intrigued with the papal see. Pope Paul published an insolent denial of Elizabeth's right to the crown, and proclaimed that of Mary. Such was the condition of kingdoms that had acknowledged the papacy! France now reckoned upon the conquest of England, and actually put the English arms into its escutcheon. Mary attempted to raise Scotland against her in alliance with France. Both France and Scotland persecuted the reformed religion. The reformers in both threw themselves on the mercy of England. Thus began the justified hostility of England to both sovereigns.

But the power of the realm was not to be shaken by the poverty of her northern neighbour, nor by the unsettled and dubious throne of her continental enemy. What could not be effected by war, was tried by treachery. Conspiracies, in long succession, were formed against Elizabeth's life. In 1563, a conspiracy was entered into by the Poles, for the death of the queen, and the proclamation of Mary. The traitors were found guilty, but not executed. In less than two years after, a league for the destruction of the protestant religion, and England at its head, was formed in the famous Bayonne conference, by the two most remorseless persecutors of the age, Catherine of Medicis, and the Duke of Alva; the one given down to the execration of mankind, by the massacre of St Bartholomew, and the other by the massacres of the people of the Netherlands, through the Inquisition. This league was formed in 1565.

Within four years, another Popish conspiracy was formed in the realm. This suddenly took the shape of open war; an insurrectionary force ap❤ peared, headed by Northumberland, and openly proclaiming the restoration of Popery. Its banner was an idolatrous emblem of " the five wounds of Christ;" and its first and congenial exploit was, the burning of the Bible and Common Prayer in Durham Cathedral. This rebellion was notoriously advised,

and stimulated by the Pope. Its lead ers were executed as traitors. The Roman Catholics hallow their memory, and pronounce them martyrs.

In the very next year was issued the celebrated" Bull," insolently declaring Elizabeth unworthy of the throne, deposing her, absolving her subjects from their allegiance, and denouncing herself as the " slave of all evil.” This “Bull” made actual procla mation of war, summoning all the Roman Catholic kingdoms to the destruction of England, and putting a dagger into the hands of every English Roman Catholic, against the lives of their fellow-subjects and the Queen. This Bull, too, the emissaries of Rome had the effrontery to fix up on the door of the Bishop of London's palace. It was sent to the Duke of Alva, and by him sent to the Spanish ambassador, who had been still suffered to remain in London. This Bull, Mr Butler, with that Jesuitical affectation of candour which marks and disgraces all his controversial works, whines over

as

ever to be condemned, and ever to be lamented," forsooth. But why does not this writer, instead of feeling regret in the style of a bad novel, and that too obviously a regret for the impolicy of the measure, and not for the crime, openly, honestly, and manfully denounce it as an atrocious and bloody incitement to rebellion and massacre; not less an insolent assumption of authority in an independent country, than a most criminal, and altogether unchristian summons to all the bad passions of the country, against its laws and the laws of God? He knows in his soul that it was all this,—that it was the unlicensed and insufferable arrogance of a foreign priest, pampered with guilty power, and inflamed with mad ambition. This would be truth, but this truth the slaves of idolatry and darkness dare not utter. So much for the sincerity and sorrow of Mr Butler.

In two years after the transmission of this infamous document, another conspiracy started up, headed by Norfolk. The proofs were unquestionable that the conspirators were in league with the Duke of Alva. A more fatal and fearful instance of the bloody spirit of Rome occurred abroad almost at the same moment. The massacre of St Bartholomew in 1572,

the complicated work of bigotry and ambition, of treachery and cruelty, -a stain for ever on the religion of France, on her throne, and on her people, yet a scarcely less damning spot upon the Papal court, which celebrated this scene of murder by public exultation and " Te Deums!"

In 1577, a Spanish army was openly assembled in the Netherlands for the conquest of England; its commander Don John was to marry the Queen of Scots; the Roman Catholic interests in England were to be summoned to the invading standard, and Popery was

to be PROPAGATED BY THE SWORD.

The kingdom was now beleaguered by enemies; the whole force of the Spanish monarchy, then the supreme power of the earth, was in open arms against it. A Popish party in Scotland was in alliance with the enemy, and the Papists in England were waiting only the signal for general rebellion. It was the first duty of the throne to expel all strangers detected as the agents of the foreign enemy. Three colleges had been established at Rheims, Douay, and Rome, for the express pur pose of training up priests to be em ployed as emissaries of rebellion in England. They had been established notoriously by the English Jesuits, as agents for the overthrow of the religion and throne of England. They were publicly declared dangerous and aliens, and commanded to quit the country on pain of death, as rebels and traitors, if they returned. Whọ but men like Dr Lingard will deny that this government, or any government, with an army gathering in its sight for its avowed destruction, had a right to take this common measure of defence, and drive traitors and spies out of the garrison, or extinguish them if they returned?

We look upon the general Roman Catholic question, in a much higher light than that of a mere parliamentary topic. The enemies of the British constitution see in it a great ground on which they may fix their batteries; and the friends of that constitution cannot be too vigorous and vigilant in meeting the attack, whether open or secret, whether hurried on by the rash and infuriate violence of faction, or silently conducted by the subtler artifices of fraudulent intrigue, and written falsehood.

In this charge of direct hostility to the Constitution, we do not desire to involve the present clamourers in Ireland. We consider them merely as ignorant and vulgar-minded men, talking of matters which they do not comprehend, labouring for results of which they have scarcely a conception, and seizing the topic, simply for the mean and miserable purposes of professional lucre. The pen of a public writer is degraded by the mention of those obscure brawlers. Public taste is insulted by the mere mention of their vulgarism, their rant, and their reviling; public feeling altogether scorns and repels their naked, low, and contemptible motives. We are satisfied that those men do not desire the overthrow of the Constitution, so long as they can make a shilling more under it, than they could under a mob government. We are satisfied, that the bitterest blow to them would be that "emancipation," for which they clamour; and that, if there was a chance of it, they would set all their engines at work to keep up a brawl, out of which they make their criminal profits, and their bastard popularity. It is a burlesque to call those Irish ranters public men.

But there is a deeper source of evil, a direct, bitter, and subtle enmity against the freedom and eminence of England, engendered in Rome, sustained by the money of the national enemy, and administered by the emissaries of Popery among ourselves. The punishment of England for its abjuration of the Papacy, is the undying hope of Popery abroad. This is notorious. The magnitude and glory of the British empire is a source of jealousy; her Popish population is a source of hope; there is a secret weekly correspondence carried on between the Papists in Ireland and England, and the Papal Court! The Jesuits, a race expelled from human society, scarcely half a century back, for offences against the civil order of all nations, have been revived by the late Pope, and been sent by the present one into England and Ireland! They are engrossing the education of the people in the north and west of Eng

:

land, they are founding seminaries in Ireland; and with foreign money in their hands, foreign principles in their heads, and the example of that long list of tyrants, idolaters, and persecutors, whose work they do; the first occasion of public calamity will find Popery showing among ourselves what it has been among the French and Spaniards, exclusive, tyrannical, and exterminating.

How near that great and final trial of the spirits may be, is of course beyond human knowledge. But that we shall have another test of our principles, another summons to the manliness and integrity of the national heart, and the holiness and truth of the Christian religion, to be on their guard against most hazardous incursion, we have no doubt. It would be easy to point out the signs by which this formidable menace is given. But it is our more important duty to take care, as far as in us lies, that the evil do not come upon us unawares. Justice and clemency to the Roman Catholic, but fidelity to the memory of our ancestors, and honour to our constitution and religion, must be our motto, when the hour of the conflict shall come.

To preserve and cherish the rights and principles of his people, is the first duty of a sovereign. This, the greatest of our queens did, and for this she deserves all the gratitude of her rescued empire. No sovereign ever had so mighty a responsibility laid upon her. The world was shaken by religious convulsion; and all its elements were leagued against the last spot to which true Christianity had fled as to a house of refuge. Military strength, full of the pride of successful wars, was arrayed against her solitary kingdom. Papal intolerance thundered against her religion. Domestic treason was darkening round her throne; but she was strong in the cause of truth, and God; and if the veil had at that hour been taken from before her eyes, she would have seen, like the servant of Elisha, her kingdom surrounded by more than mortal protection-the "horses and the chariots of fire."

yers, you knows, and are nicely up to the tipping us off their chin-music.' "That's buttering a whiting, you mean, I fancy,' chimed Blyth.

"For my part,' resumed Allen, I never did see these wiseheads meet together, yet, but what they were always a-hatching of mischief; and, in faith, I expect little else now, come the squall when it may. But, zounds, what's the use on us sitting stuck up here palavering about what is all in my eye and Betty Martin?-Come, my hearts, let us on deck at once, and have a look round us; unless, indeed, our worthy Glynne, there, has got some stuff in his locker, and then, why, I haven't the smallest objections to our diving below.'

"Bah, bah,-no such thing, Allen,' cried the President, loudly; indeed, indeed, mates, it must not be. Recol lect for a moment what you are waiting here for,-to meet with your officers and commanders; and recollect also the mighty importance of the duty committed to your care-no less than the looking after the interests of thousands, who all have their eyes on you. For God's sake, then, my hearts, think not of grog, I beseech you-I can see no harm in your breaking up and going on deck-but I must decidedly insist that you shall neither leave the ship, nor fall to a grog-guzzling.'

Well, well, Morris,' said Valentine Joyce, gruffly, you're our officer at present, you know, and must be obeyed; but for all that, in my way of thinking, I can see little harm in Glynne's sporting us a tot or two of his supernaculum, were it no more than to kill time agreeably. However, hang it, let us be jogging, for my shankpainters are getting as crank and stiff as e'er an old woman's in the kingdom.'

66

Accordingly the council broke up, and were speedily squandered about the various decks. For my own part I retired to my birth, accompanied by Jamie Blyth, with whom I had a long and a serious talk on the matters then going on; in the course of which I discovered, with exceeding regret, that, countryman of mine though he was, and a shrewd, intelligent fellow to boot, he was a complete unbeliever in the fair promises of Government, notoriously infected with disloyalty, and all them other new-fangled wild principles, and altogether, neck and crop,

a keen fellow for change and innova❤ tion.'

"I think we had chatted the best part of a couple of bells, and in faith I was beginning to get heartily sick of his nonsense, when all hands were piped suddenly on deck, and, hurrying up, who should I see there but our old skipper standing at the capstan uncovered, with a huge lot of papers before him! Having read over these, which contained a frank agreement to grant all our demands, he proceeded to ask the ship's company assembled round him, whether they were now satisfied, and would return to their duty;-but this was a question which no one thought proper to answer. At last, fearful our silence might be misconstrued, I took speech in hand myself, and plumply and flatly told the old boy, that the conducting and setling of the whole affair had been consigned into the hands of the delegates, and to them he must apply for an answer,-adding, that I had no doubt but what they agreed to would amply satisfy the fleet.

"Then why don't you call them together, Adams?' said Captain Lock, peevishly; or must I go and beseech them to give his Majesty's message a hearing? I understand the fellows have had the presumption to disgrace my unfortunate vessel by holding their infernal divan in her. It's not unlikely then but they may be on board even now. Go call them together instantly, I command you.'

"I was here very luckily prevented from replying to this vinegar remark, by the abrupt interference of a bulky booby of a holder, who thundered out, laying hold of the Captain's collar,

I'se ha' thee to understond, Loack, thee hast no cummond here noaw-adees, zo had'st better be zivil. Zookers, fellows did'st thee zay!-dang it, doesn't knaw we ha' a yeard-rope very much at thee sarvice-or would'st prefer a zound ducking

"For shame, Gregory,' cried I, interrupting the rude lout, for shame, and recollect who you are speaking to; for mind me, mate, this gentleman comes not here as your commanding officer, but as an ambassador from the Lords Admirals themselves, as well as the Commons, and Lords, and King of the country. So off hands, if you please, and behave to the gentleman as a gentleman, and as one who