fortune which he had so improved and increased from the late troubles.* 18. The plans, projects and conduct of Charles and his cabal administration perhaps never will be fully and fairly disclosed. It appears upon the whole, that there was in agitation a very extensive design concerted with the French monarch for altering the constitutional system of the British government. The prompt and undoubted fidelity of the Irish catholics was, without their knowing it, to have been rendered auxiliary to the execution of the main plan. It was most probably defeated by the discordant principles of the members of the cabal amongst themselves, no less than by the excessive insincerity of the sovereign both to his ministers and to the public. 19. Ormond was not a fit tool for the purposes of the cabal: and no other motive could perhaps have instigated him to advocate the cause of his catholic countrymen but opposition to his political rivals. Now, for the first time, he could discover the injustice and impolicy of forcing conscience by sanguinary laws in matters of religion.† He reprobated and resisted the attempts of others to throw fresh severity upon the catholics, whom he had till then, with unrelenting asperity, maltreated, persecuted, and oppressed. 20. During the remainder of the reign of Charles II. many deep and malicious attempts were set on foot to fix * Whilst the earl of Essex was Lord-lieutenant in 1674, he thus expressed himself upon the subject of Ormond's gains by the rebellions: "My lord duke of Ormond has received above three hundred thousand pounds in this kingdom, besides all his great places and emoluments, and I am sure the losses of his private estates have not been equal to those I have suffered (in the preceding civil war), and yet he is so happy as no exception is taken to it." (St. Let. p. 213.) A list of the lands in the several counties of Galway, Kildare, Meath, Dublin, Waterford, Catherlogh, Kilkenny, and Tipperary, with the names of the old proprietors, amounting to 54, of whom 14 were of his own family, of the name of Butler, is to be seen in the App. to Car. Orm, vol. ii. p. 132. The like charge was made against Lord Clarendon by Sir Charles Wogan, a nephew of the duke of Tyrconnel, in a letter written in 1723 to Dean Swift. Swift's Works, vol. xii. p. 315. Lond. ed. 1808. "Though thousands of loyal families had been undone by the rebellion, Clarendon, by imposing on his master's indolence and facility, ordered matters so, that he was the only considerable gainer by the restoration, and made his fortune by perpetuating the distress and unaccountable hard fate of the cavaliers after the return of their prince." See his letter upon this subject to his son, the earl of Arran, which contains very liberal sentiments, which Ormond had uniformly acted against up to that time. Car. Orm. vol. ii. 535. Plots are the the Irish with fresh plots and insurrections. most wicked engines of the worst of ministers. This was the reign of plots,* and plotters were encouraged and pensioned. Ormond's biographical panegyrist allows, that at this time there were too many protestants in Ireland who wanted another rebellion, that they might increase their estates by new forfeitures; and letters were perpetually sent to England, misrepresenting the Lord-lieutenant's conduct and the state of things in Ireland. Shoals of the most abandoned miscreants were brought over from Ireland, to swear to plots and conspiracies the most horrid and improbable. These informations were countenanced by the cabal: even Ormond himself was alarmed lest their perjuries might go the length of involving his grace in some treasonable conspiracy. The most tragical effect of all these perjured informers was the trial and execution of Oliver Plunkett,§ the * Oates had a pension of 12007. and apartments at Whitehall. He was convicted under James II. of perjury, by the evidence of sixty respectable witnesses; was fined in 2000 marks, whipped, and pilloried. He was a favourite of king William, with whom he had been intimate in Holland, and who gave him a pension of 4007. for his life. Grainger, vol. iv. 248. + Car. Orm. v. ii. 482. ‡ Ormond writes to his son, Lord Arran, “Though it be manifest that most of our discoveries give more discredit than confirmation to the plot, it is well that I am not like to be charged for a plutter or a papist. § This venerable prelate was even spoken well of by Ormond on several occasions. A letter from his grace to his son, the earl of Arran, dated the 29th of December, 1680, shews his opinion upon the case; "Here is also one Owen Murphy, authorized to search for and carry over witnesses (I suppose) to give evidence against Oliver Plunkett. He has been as far as the county of Tipperary, and brought thence about a dozen people, not likely to say any thing material to Plunkett; so that I believe he takes these upon the account of Eustace Cummins' mad narrative." Ormond, in writing to his son with plentitude of confidence, discloses in this very letter to the world, that determined policy of Machiavel, which perhaps he meant to have confined as a secret to his own family "My aim was," says he," to work a division amongst the Romish clergy, and I believe I had compassed it to the great security of the government and protestants. He complains also of the indulgence of some, and the ignorance of others, who " did not consider the advantages of the division designed.' Unhappy government, the security of which rests on the division of his majesty's subjects! " Even Burnett, who will not readily be condemned for his overstrained partiality to the Irish or the papists, has rendered an honourable testimony of archbishop Plunkett. Hist. of his own Times, vol. i. 230. "Plunkett was at this time brought to his trial. Some lewd Irish priests and others of that nation, hearing that England was then Roman catholic archbishop of Armagh, a man in universal estimation for his amiable qualities and exemplary conduct. 21. Ormond was succeeded by Lord Roberts, and then by the earl of Essex. He was again taken into favour, and retained the government till the demise of the king. His majesty had, however, a very short time before his death intimated to Ormond his intention of removing him, and send ́ing over the earl of Rochester to replace him. It appears clear, that Ormond's inexorable abhorrence of the Roman catholics was the king's principal motive for this intention. 22. Charles had it in contemplation to call out the services of the Irish army for purposes which have not been explicitly disclosed to posterity. He was then filling it with officers of the catholic persuasion who had served on the continent; and well knew that Ormond would oppose that measure. Charles II. died on the 6th of February, 1685; having a short time before his death been formally received into the Roman catholic church by father Huddlestone, a Benedictine monk, who administered to him the sacraments and other spiritual assistance according to the Roman ritual. disposed to hearken to good swearers, thought themselves well qualified for the employment; so they came over to swear that there was a great plot in Ireland. The witnesses were brutal and profligate men; yet the earl of Shaftesbury cherished them much; they were examined by parliament at Westminster, yet what they said was believed. Some of these priests had been censured by him for their lewdness. Plunkett had nothing to say in his defence, but to deny all; so he was condemned, and suffered very decently, expressing himself in many particulars as became a bishop; he died denying every thing that had been sworn against him." 313 CHAPTER IX. 1685.-JAMES II. 1. THE reign of James II. was one of the shortest, though most important, of any since the annexation of Ireland to the crown of England. The confidence of the catholics in both kingdoms had been greatly increased by the rejection of the exclusion bill and the quiet succession of the duke of York, who was proclaimed king in London, on the very day of his brother's demise, with the usual formalities. Charles, though long predisposed to the Roman catholic religion, ventured only to make public profession of it in his last hours. James had long openly professed and practised it. His first act in Ireland was to remove Ormond from the government, and to commit it to Boyle, the lord primate and chancellor, and the earl of Granard as lords-justices. They were both protestants. The primate was considered by the puritans as a high churchman little removed from popery; and Lord Granard, from having intermarried with a lady of presbyterian principles, was looked up to as the stanch friend and protector of the puritanical party. The extraordinary phenomenon of a catholic monarch on the throne of Ireland brought the dying embers of fanatical virulence into collision with the rising confidence of the Roman catholics. Mutual charges and accusations of plots and conspiracies harassed the government, and rendered the situation of the lords-justices so unpleasant, that Lord Granard pressed his majesty to dismiss him from his station. The king, conscious of his fidelity, wrote to induce him to retain his situation, and particularly assured him that nothing should be done in Ireland prejudicial to the protestant religion.* The rebellions of Argyle and Monmouth found no open adherents in Ireland. And the king's orders for disarming the Irish militia, which consisted wholly of pro * James upon his accession to the throne of England assured his council, which he afterwards repeated to his parliament, that "he should make it his endeavour to preserve the government, both in church and state, as it was then by law established, and that he would go as far as any man in preserving all the just rights and liberties of the nation." HIST IREL. VOL. I. 14 testants, embodied and appointed by Ormond, were executed without resistance, but not without reluctance and fear. Their arms were quietly deposited in the king's stores. 2. The reign of this unfortunate monarch was pregnant with events, which have been differently represented by the English and Irish historians, according to the party prepossessions under which both have written.* The earl of Clarendon, whose sister James had married, was appointed Lord-lieutenant; but he was probably too firmly attached to the protestant interest to give as largely into James's measures as was expected at his hands. His instructions *The great book of authority which the English look up to, and of which the Irish loudly complain, is, The State of the Protestants of Ireland under the late king James's Government, in which their carriage towards him is justified, and the absolute Necessity of their endeavouring to be freed from his Government, and of submitting to their present majesties, is demonstrated. It was written, as by the title sufficiently appears, immediately after the revolution, to make court to king William; and is attributed to Dr. King, who was made bishop of Derry in 1690, and translated to the see of Dublin in 1702. Dr. Lesley, the famous protestant divine, wrote an answer to this book, in which he proves most of Dr. King's charges to be either absolutely false or grossly exaggerated. Lesley's answer was never replied to, and by the turn of politics was suppressed even in the first edition, whereas Dr. King's has gone through several. Swift says, Lesley was a nonjuror; and Swift was as little disposed to favour papists as puritans or republicans. "Without doubt Mr. Lesley is unhappily misled in his politics: but he has given the world such a proof of his soundness in religion, as many a bishop ought to be proud of I never saw the gentleman in my life: I know he is the son of a great prelate, who, upon several accounts, was one of the most extraordinary men of his age. I verily believe he acted from a mistaken conscience (in refusing to swear allegiance to king William), and therefore I distinguish between the principles and the person. However, it is some mortification to me, when I see an avowed nonjuror contribute more to the confounding of popery, than could ever be done by an hundred thousand such introductions." (Swift's Preface to Burnet's Introduction to his History of the Reformation). It should also be added, that Dr. King had been before the revolution in favour with James, and had expressed sentiments of the stanchest toryism: but on being detected in a correspondence with the prince of Orange and the northern rebels, was committed to prison; from whence he was discharged upon lord chief justice Herbert undertaking to answer for his loyalty to king James; at which his lordship was afterwards much chagrined. + Hence his frequent complaints of his majesty's want of confidence in him: " I shall be able to do the king more or less service according to the credit and countenance the world finds I have from his majesty." And "certainly it would not be to the prejudice of the king's service to have the chief governor a little consulted with.” (State Letters, vol. i. p. 114.) In the same letter to the lord treaSurer, he says, "His majesty knows that I will, as well as must, |