THE CASE OF IRELAND.

Thames Star, Volume XI, Issue 3480, 19 February 1880, Page 2

THE CASE OF IRELAND.

To the Editor of the Evening Stab,

Sib,—l little thought when I penned ', ji r ''few. remarks on historic events | that such a storm of invective would be hurled at me by the prophet who lives in our midst.- For my part I abominate intolerance, whether it emanates from Protestants or Catholics—or Ultramontaniats—if that term suits your corres"pon- j dent better. Ihe facts of history cannot > be gainsayed ; unhappily, it is the duty of any impartial historian to record thaf, those who might be supposed to have learnt tolerance and kindness in the hard, school of persecution through wliich they passed, proved themselves almost equally cruel with thoir adversaries. If the Catholics burned Santre and Savonarola, "Calvin himself burned Sorvetus; if Latimer, Ridley, and Cranmer perished i for conscience sake under " bloody Mary," Bocher an 1 Van Paris were burned to death by.order of the founder of Christ's Hospital, and ." Good Queen Bess " had as long a list us her sister of victims, to the cauie of freedom of conscience. Law, custom, and modern habits of thought preclude the rekindling of the faggots; but the "old hatreds are not dead, the old evil is still alive; and we are prone,, in the absence of other means, to make these hatreds felt with weapons which out deeper than swords. Let-; m> fenaind -Wm. Wood of the saying of.the Apostle of Him in whose name bigotry slew its victims, the Apostle.of Him who condemned no man, "Be ye kind one to another, tender hearted, forgiving one another, &c.", According Jq your correspondent's exposition,, Irishmen are ineligible for parliamentary rights because they are in the " iron grasp of Homo's bishops and priests." If that is so, any other Catholic country h.as ao right to its political privileges. ' Any one who will take the trouble to look over a file of Enoch, wil! find that the predicted time has arrived for the great simple, but hero we are in 1880 and seed time qnd, harvest succeed each oth,er in the same regularity 8$ of old." I will not hit too hard at a crack-brained enthusiast, but will await with interest the prophetical article concerning Ireland, and the battle of Armageddon. In calling the Covenanters and the Puritans " Fenians" - I did so figuratively, inasmuch as they were iv rebellion to the reigning dynasty, in the same manner as the Fenians of the ninetepth pentury. Granted that they were battling for what they considered their religious freedom and political rights, that brings then) tQ a level with many ardent oatholic Irishmen, or Fenians. As for the Fenian oath, Wm. Wood knows more about it than I do, and as for "playing the man aqd sjsning my real name" on the invitation of your correspondent I should he an embryo donkey indeed. Aa Wm. .Wood knows me so well there is. no occasion for it; X make ho secret of my opinions to anyone, be he toleranf o bigoted.—l am, <&c. Loyalist.