You are so kind in the expression of an interest for my
recovery, that I must thank you, au
risque, to take up valuable time with reading a very dull
letter. I have suffered from an attack of the chest; a blood-vessel I broke
thirty years ago seemed inclined to go over its old train of pain and disease;
but it has
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Now you know as much as I do myself of
“mon physique et mm
moral;” and I rejoice that you are content with the
success of your novel and of the profits. People have more time to read away
from this town, I believe, and think more about books of amusement; but I am
quite sure the reviews prevent three parts of society from going through any
book in London. I fear it will make enemies amongst the survivors of the
cabinet of 1786. You have written powerfully, and many of great judgment say so
when they dare; but the ladies are vociferous in condemnation of what they call
blasphemy and indecency, and conceive me very atrocious for not having
discovered either the one or the other defect in the book. The king, I find, was interested in the lighter parts;
but some of the charges against the Irish government, he said, were too bad,
while God knows they were not half bad enough to my mind. Now, what I like best
in the whole was Shane; he beats Eddie Ochiltree off the ground. I wish he had not
killed anybody, nor been killed; but all the poetical fancies will fix upon
him, if he had murdered all the excisemen in Europe. In short, I love him so
that I think he is the hero of the tale, and the Miss
Mac Taafs the heroines. I must, however, tell you that I am so
miserably convinced, by all I have ever read or seen, of the tendency of Roman Catholic tenets to put down human
intellect, to control and guide all human interests to their own profit, and to
create control even in the heart of every
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Our own church has preserved too many Catholic trappings, which common sense must reject. I regret, so far as Ireland is concerned, that at the time we had our volunteers, our patriot hands were not strengthened to make a division of church lands, which would have afforded proper provision both for Protestant and Roman Catholic pastors of all ranks; neither of them could then have stripped the peasant of his mite,—the first by impoverishing him, and the other by superstitious rites.
I think my dear Mr. Grattan was short-sighted in not getting us over this step when we had arms in our hands.
My Lord (who when he was sixteen was generalissimo of volunteers for the King’s County) says, “you have underrated the whole force by two-thirds;” and also, he says, “there was not one Roman Catholic received into the original institution.” He was also deputy to the Convention from the King’s County.
We had been so enslaved and so impoverished, that even men like Grattan thought wonders were accomplished in 1782, by hearing us called free, and having a ship or two allowed us, and being permitted to decide finally upon our own cause and in our own parliament.
They ought to have foreseen that with revived energies
Ireland should naturally become a still greater
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Whatever objections philosophical inquiry may incline to make, the Church of England is pure in its precepts, and does not, by oral confession, put us into the hands of creatures as fallible as ourselves; whose interest it is to subdue our energies and destroy our judgment, in order to direct into one channel the exercise of intellect and property. But this opportunity is past; we can do nothing now but look on; I hope times will mend, as the old phrase says.
I hear from authority, Sir William Knighton now settles all things here. It is certain the king said he loved Lord Holland as his brother, but it is a new question for a British king to ask what the Emperor of Austria and King of France would say to a Whig ministry! Objecting to Lord Holland is objecting to one of the best friends of Old England. I am, and always was, for liberty, for law, and for full exercise of religious opinion; but I would have no man a legislator who was bound to follow the direction of his priest; consequently, no Roman Catholic in either house of parliament.
Many people fancy your enlightened Catholics do not
confess or would allow of political control; if they
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Lady Anglesey, I think, will never be able to go. I hope Mr. Lamb will stay. You are right, Lady Caroline was scarcely accountable, and is to be pitied; but better her poor heart ceased to beat than stand in the way of the good he may do.
My little grandson is Jean Jacques!! Viva! compliments to your sposo.
