rebels, many thousands of them murdered, the rest deprived of their estates, and driven to live on a small pittance in the wilds of Connaught; at a time when either the Rump or Cromwell absolutely governed the three kingdoms.  And the question will turn upon this, Whether the Catholics, deprived of all their possessions, governed with a rod of iron, and in utter despair of ever seeing the monarchy restored, for the preservation of which they had suffered so much, were to be blamed for calling in a foreign prince of their own religion, who had a considerable army to support them; rather than submit to so infamous an usurper as Cromwell, or such a bloody and ignominious conventicle as the Rump.  And I have often heard, not only our friends the Dissenters, but even our common enemy the Conformists, who are conversant in the history of those times, freely confess, that considering the miserable situation the Irish were then in, they could not have thought of a braver or more virtuous attempt; by which they might have been instruments of restoring the lawful monarch, at least to the recovery of England and Scotland, from those betrayers, and sellers, and murderers of his royal father.

To conclude, Whereas the last quoted author complains very heavily and frequently of a brand that lies upon them, it is a great mistake:  For the first original brand hath been long taken off.  Only we confess, the scar will probably remain and be visible for ever to those who know the principles by which they acted, and until those principles shall be openly renounced; else it must continue to all generations, like the mark set upon Cain, which some authors say descended to all his posterity:  Or like the Roman nose and Austrian lip, or like the long bag of flesh hanging down from the gills of the people in Piedmont.  But as for any brands fixed on schismatics for several years past, they have been all made with cold iron; like thieves, who by the benefit of the clergy are condemned to be only burned in the hand; but escape the pain and the mark, by being in fee with the jailor.  Which advantage the schismatical teachers will never want, who, as we are assured, and of which there is a very fresh instance, have the souls, and bodies, and purses of the people a hundred times more at their mercy, than the Catholic priests could ever pretend to.

Therefore, upon the whole, the Catholics do humbly petition (without the least insinuation of threatening) that upon this favourable juncture their incapacity for civil and military employments may be wholly taken off, for the very same reasons (besides others more cogent) that are now offered by their brethren the Dissenters.

And your petitioners, as in duty bound, shall ever pray, &c.[9]

Dublin, Nov. 1733.

[Footnote 9:  In this controversy the author was again victorious, for the Test was not repealed. [H.]]

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