servants were about to proceed to the wholesale confiscation of the province of Connaught. The catholic proprietors endeavoured to avert the ruin which was impending over them by offering the greedy monarch a bribe of £10,000; and while he was meditating between the smaller gain within his reach, and the larger plunder in prospect, he was cut off by a mortal disease in the year 1625, leaving his son Charles to carry on the work of spoliation in Ireland, and of despotism in England, and to reap the reward in an ignominious death on a public scaffold.

The religious history of this reign differs but little from that of the preceding one. There was the same amount of despotic intolerance, if not of furious persecution. The reign of James, whose character was a mixture of vanity, cunning, and greed, was, however, chiefly expended on schemes of confiscation and plunder through the agency of the law, whose powers were wielded by his despicable instruments. Yet the fires of persecution were not allowed to cool. The Ecclesiastical Courts were then, as now, inquisitions, in which the souls and bodies of the conscientious were tortured. Catholics were there excommunicated as "recusants," and punished both by severe fines and long imprisonments. "The whole business of these courts," says Bishop Burnett, in his life of Bishop Bedell, "seemed to be nothing but oppression and extortion; the solemnest and sacredest of all church censures, which was excommunication, went about in so sordid and base a manner, that all regard to it, as a spiritual censure, was lost, and the effect it had in law made it to be cried out upon as a most intolerable piece of tyranny. The officers of the courts thought they had a right to oppress the natives; and that all was well got that was wrung from them." The places in those courts were bought, and the power which they gave was turned to profit in the way of fines and bribes extorted from the victims on whom they fastened. The catholic clergy, as well as laity, were also victimized by such means. Many of them were condemned to long imprisonments. The catholic bishop of Down and Connor, was hanged, drawn, and quartered; and many others of the inferior clergy were punished for their "recusancy," with death.

It was scarcely to be expected that such measures as these would reconcile the people of Ireland to protestant ascendancy, or greatly impress their minds with a conviction of the beauties of the new religion. On the contrary, they must necessarily have produced a feeling of inveterate hostility, in the minds of the people, to the authors of such cold blooded cruelty and unprincipled spoliation. Was it to be expected that a whole nation would at once abandon the cherished faith of their fathers, and overturn all that had been venerated and adored in the land for centuries, in favour of doctrines which they had been taught to believe were heretical, blasphemous, and dangerous to salvation, especially when the professors of the new faith came before them in the guise of robbers and persecutors, having pleasure rather in the torture and spoliation of the people

than in their conversion to a religion of charity, and peace, and love? Of all sights, indeed, to be seen in this world, there is none more disgusting than that of a daily life and practice on the part of religionists, which is at direct variance with the doctrines they profess. Even though the religion which they preach be true, those to whom it is offered, cannot but shrink back from it with aversion, when they see it associated with hypocrisy, deceit, and acted falsehood. No wonder that the Irish people rejected the new faith with disdain, when offered to them by the plundering harpies who now came to them in the guise of protestant reformers. And it is honourable to the Irish catholics that they continued to preserve their consistency and to hold by their early faith, notwithstanding all the cruel means by which the new creed was attempted to be enforced upon them by the emissaries of the government.

The condition of the great body of the Irish people, at this period, may be inferred from the measures which were adopted to dispossess them of their lands and habitations. Extermination would have been mercy compared with the misery which thousands of them were now compelled to undergo. Driven from their homes, and their property forcibly taken possession of by strangers and foreigners, they wandered about in multitudes, destitute, starving, and desperate. Many perished of hunger. Others took to the woods and mountains, and lived a lawless and half-savage life. Thousands were reduced to beggary; while those who remained on the estates of the new settlers were held in a state of abject thraldom and servitude. They had no hold upon their masters, but were liable to be turned adrift at a moment's notice. The Brehon laws had now been abolished, and the native chiefs no longer felt themselves called upon to extend their protection to the mass of the labouring population. The bond of allegiance between the upper and lower classes of society was broken; and there now stood ranged on opposite sides, the landlord Few, enjoying their unjustly acquired possessions in fear and trembling, and the great mass of the native population, landless, homeless, starving, and destitute. The nation now contained within it all the elements of insurrection, anarchy, agrarian outrage, revolution, and general

overturn.

Such was Ireland at the conclusion of James's reign; during which the catholic property-holders had been, under various pretences, plundered of nearly three millions of acres of land, which were cleared of their native cultivators to make room for settlers from England and Scotland; and during which, also, the legislative preponderance of the catholics was overturned by a stroke of despotic power, which raised a corrupt ascendancy on the ruins of the popular interest, and turned all the powers of civil and religious tyranny against the great body of the native people of Ireland. James was not unfrequently addressed, by his parasites, as the Solomon of his day. In one sense, indeed, he answered to the

description, for he not only chastised his people with whips, but was preparing for them a hopeful successor, who would visit them with scorpions.' The proofs of this will be found in abundance in the course of the next chapter.

CHAPTER XIII.

Despotism in England-Resistance of the people--Ireland at the accession of Charles I.--the Irish catholics grant him a large subsidy-"The Graces"-Lord Wentworth-His character-Arrives in Dublin as lord-deputy-Calls a ParliamentHis proposals-Obtains six subsidies-The second session-Is again successful— Public measures of improvement-Further confiscations of property-His arbitrary measures-Discontent increases-Returns to England-The English parliament-Rebellion of the Scotch-The Danger increases-Wentworth's energy -Civil war breaks out in England-Wentworth is impeached-And executed.

WHILE the liberties of Ireland were thus strangled by the agents. of despotic power, amidst the submissiveness of the Irish nation,* the English were preparing for one of the noblest and most successful resistances to a despotism of the same kind, which has ever been recorded in the history of nations. Tyrannic and irresponsible power had, during the last few reigns, been gradually closing around the liberties of the people. The rights of persons, property, and conscience, had been invaded, while the prerogatives of royalty had been advancing with a steady step. The arrogance of the Tudors had been succeeded by the blinded despotism of the Stuarts. Magna Charta, in their hands, had become a dead letter; and the writ of habeas corpus weaker than a cobweb, as a protection from arbitrary assault. Law was now merely the instrument of the crown to enforce obedience to its exactions. The courts were little better than the "caverns of murderers."+ Monopolies were erected, which crushed industry to the earth. The press was held in shackles. Religion was persecuted. The liberty enjoyed by the subject was a mere mockery. The king usurped the functions of the legislature, and regularly imposed taxes without the consent of parliament. He violated the laws daily. In the meantime, profligacy, licentiousness, and vice, pervaded the atmosphere of the court; and the aristocratic caste presented an example to the people, of gross immorality, sensuality, and extravagance. The state church, too, which in Ireland was attempting to persecute the people into protestantism, was now in England attempting to persecute them back to catholicism. The tyranny of the church and the crown went hand in hand. Laud and Charles alike aimed at despotic power, the one over the church, the other over the state. Laud's ambition

Such was the submissiveness of Ireland during the reign of James, and in the midst of all his confiscations and persecutions, that the standing army, which, at the commencement of it, amounted to 20,000, towards its close had been reduced to a force of only 1,550 men!

+ Hallam.

was to be an English Pope; Charles's to be an absolute despot, uncontrolled by law or by parliament,--and, in working out this design, the church took him under her keeping, and solemnly led him to destruction.

An opposition was not long in showing itself among the English people. The middle classes had recently sprung up into some importance, and, as through a glass darkly,' were beginning to discern something of the true character of the principles of popular liberty. Education was spreading among them; for the Printingpress was now at work, and scattering abroad the seeds of knowledge, liberty, and social and political independence. The principles of the Reformation also were now working in the minds of the people, and rousing them into unwonted activity. For, whatever may be our several opinions of the religious changes of the time, there can be only one opinion as to the effect which that great religious movement had upon the condition of the public mind and the subsequent progress of man in knowledge and civilization. It thoroughly roused the masses from the slumber of centuries, and let loose upon society an immense amount of mental activity, which down to that period had been completely pent up. It gave an impulse to investigation, scrutiny, and inquiry, which soon extended itself over the entire field of human relations.

The anti

Turn we again to Ireland, where the suffering people indulged in prospects of toleration on the accession of Charles I. to the throne. Charles was known to have a strong leaning towards catholicism; and his marriage to a catholic princess shortly after his ascension, gave renewed hope to the party throughout the empire. cipations of the Irish catholics ended, as usual, in disappointment. No change was made except for the worse. No matter who reigned in England, whether Tudor or Stuart, whether protestant or catholic, it was alike to Ireland: the agents might be changed, but the system remained the same: persecution and confiscation were the lot of the Irish under all administrations.

The catholic landholders, who had been alarmed by the projected seizure of the whole of Connaught during the former reign, under the pretence of defective titles, resolved to take immediate steps to avert the danger still impending over them. The old proprietors of Irish estates feared lest they should all be involved, in course of time, in the same general confiscation. They held a meeting in Dublin, and, aware of the royal necessities, voluntarily agreed to grant the sum of £120,000 (an immense sum in those times), payable in three years. They only required, in return for this, that Charles should grant them the commonest rudiments of justice -such as making due provision for the security of property, the administration of justice, the freedom of industry, the regulation of the clergy, the restraining of the tyranny of ecclesiastical courts, and the prevention of inquiries into the titles of estates beyond a certain period. All these demands were perfectly fair and

H

equitable; and Charles, tempted by the subsidy, at once agreed to grant them under the name of "The Graces:" he pocketed the money, and the catholics considered themselves comparatively safe. Scarcely, however, had the bargain been concluded, than a proclamation was issued commanding the catholics to forbear the exercise of their rites and ceremonies; and ere long, it was quite apparent that Charles had no intention whatever of fulfilling his solemn promises. He made a technical informality in the writs for summoning parliament, a pretence for delaying the Graces during Lord Falkland's administration; and when the consideration of the matter could no longer be deferred, he sent over "a bold bad man,” Thomas Wentworth, afterwards Earl of Strafford, to keep things quiet among the discontented and complaining Irish.

Wentworth was one of the boldest and most impetuous instruments that ever lent itself to the support of despotism. He was haughty, ambitious, tyrannical, revengeful. He was unscrupulous in the employment of means for the advancement of his power, which he used for purposes of self-aggrandisement, and not unfrequently for the gratification of malignant passions. A thorough aristocrat at heart, he despised the people, whom he ruled over as a despot. And yet this man started in life as a popular leader, and served in the same ranks with Pym, Vane, Eliot, and others. But like all apostates from the cause of the people, he had no sooner joined the ranks of the enemy, than he distinguished himself by his persecution of the party he had abandoned. There was not a particle of indecision in his whole character. He threw himself, body and soul, into whatever cause he espoused. His talents, too, were of the most splendid kind. It was of Strafford's "rare abilities" that Lord Digby spoke, where he said that "God had given him the use of them, but the devil the application." He had also a wonderful influence over other men, carrying them with him almost whithersoever he would; though he afterwards had to contend with men greater than himself, backed, however, by a whole people, by whom he was completely overthrown.

Such was the manner of a man to whom Charles now delivered over the government of Ireland. The country was in a critical state torn to pieces by the dissensions of religious parties, and grievously oppressed by the church courts, the exactions of the established priesthood, the existence of hateful monopolies, and other crying abuses. Armed with extraordinary powers, Wentworth set out for Dublin. He entered Ireland as a despot, with one paramount object, that of making his master "the most absolute prince in Christendom," in so far as regarded that "conquered country." Behold Ireland, then, now under the iron-rule of an unscrupulous tyrant! It was not long before the entire nation was found groaning under him in agony. His first act was to call a parliament for the purpose of sanctioning his absolute measures; and Irish parliaments were generally found venal and