knew no obstacles; he continued against all difficulties in his dogged and yet able manner to establish some order out of the chaos of Ireland’s condition.  But his government was the outcome of a profound conviction that only in the interest of England should Ireland be governed.  If Ireland could be made prosperous and contented, so much more good would accrue to England.  But that prosperity and that contentment had nothing whatever to do with safeguarding Irish institutions, or recognizing the rights of the Irish people.  If he gave way to popular opinion at all, it was because it was either expedient or beneficial to the English interest.  If he urged, as he did, the founding of Protestant Charter schools, it was because this would strengthen the English power.  To preserve that he obtained the enactment of a statute which excluded Roman Catholics from the legal profession and the offices of legal administration; and another act of his making actually disfranchised them altogether.  Boulter was also a member of the Irish Privy Council, and Lord Justice of Ireland.  The latter office he held under the vice-regencies of Carteret, Dorset and Devonshire.  His secretary, Ambrose Philips, had been connected with him, in earlier years, in contributing to a periodical entitled, “The Free Thinker,” which appeared in 1718.  Philips, in 1769, supervised the publication of Boulter’s “Letters,” which were published at Oxford. [T.S.]]

Another slander spread by Wood and his emissaries is, that by opposing him we discover an inclination to “shake off our dependence upon the crown of England.”  Pray observe how important a person is this same William Wood, and how the public weal of two kingdoms is involved in his private interest.  First, all those who refuse to take his coin are Papists; for he tells us that “none but Papists are associated against him;” Secondly, they “dispute the King’s prerogative;” Thirdly, “they are ripe for rebellion,” and Fourthly, they are going to “shake off their dependence upon the crown of England;” That is to say, “they are going to choose another king;” For there can be no other meaning in this expression, however some may pretend to strain it.

And this gives me an opportunity of explaining, to those who are ignorant, another point, which hath often swelled in my breast.  Those who come over hither to us from England, and some weak people among ourselves, whenever in discourse we make mention of liberty and property, shake their heads, and tell us, that Ireland is a “depending kingdom,” as if they would seem, by this phrase, to intend that the people of Ireland is in some state of slavery or dependence different from those of England; Whereas a “depending kingdom” is a modern term of art, unknown, as I have heard, to all ancient civilians, and writers upon government; and Ireland is on the contrary called in some statutes an “imperial crown,” as held only from God; which is as high a style as any kingdom is capable of receiving.