Cyclops, had too much sense to venture again into the same cavern.  But I conceive too high an opinion of the Irish legislature to think that they are to their fellow-citizens what the grand oppressors of mankind were to a people whom the fortune of war had subjected to their power.  For though Cato could use such a parallel with regard to his Senate, I should really think it nothing short of impious to compare an Irish Parliament to a den of Cyclops.  I hope the people, both here and with you, will always apply to the House of Commons with becoming modesty, but at the same time with minds unembarrassed with any sort of terror.

As to the means which the Catholics employ to obtain this object, so worthy of sober and rational minds, I do admit that such means may be used in the pursuit of it as may make it proper for the legislature, in this case, to defer their compliance until the demandants are brought to a proper sense of their duty.  A concession in which the governing power of our country loses its dignity is dearly bought even by him who obtains his object.  All the people have a deep interest in the dignity of Parliament.  But as the refusal of franchises which are drawn out of the first vital stamina of the British Constitution is a very serious thing, we ought to be very sure that the manner and spirit of the application is offensive and dangerous indeed, before we ultimately reject all applications of this nature.  The mode of application, I hear, is by petition.  It is the manner in which all the sovereign powers of the world are approached; and I never heard (except in the case of James the Second) that any prince considered this manner of supplication to be contrary to the humility of a subject or to the respect due to the person or authority of the sovereign.  This rule, and a correspondent practice, are observed from the Grand Seignior down to the most petty prince or republic in Europe.

You have sent me several papers, some in print, some in manuscript.  I think I had seen all of them, except the formula of association.  I confess they appear to me to contain matter mischievous, and capable of giving alarm, if the spirit in which they are written should be found to make any considerable progress.  But I am at a loss to know how to apply them as objections to the case now before us.  When I find that the General Committee which acts for the Roman Catholics in Dublin prefers the association proposed in the written draught you have sent me to a respectful application in Parliament, I shall think the persons who sign such a paper to be unworthy of any privilege which may be thought fit to be granted, and that such men ought, by name, to be excepted from any benefit under the Constitution to which they offer this violence.  But I do not find that this form of a seditious league has been signed by any person whatsoever, either on the part of the supposed projectors, or on the part of those whom it is calculated to seduce.  I do not find,