THE POPISH PLOTS TO SUBVERT BRITISH INSTITUTIONS.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume III, Issue 124, 10 September 1875, Page 16

THE POPISH PLOTS TO SUBVERT BRITISH INSTITUTIONS.

1 1 1 Thi London correspondent of the Brooklyn ' Catholic Review' thus "peaks with regard to those champions of *' religious liberty." — Messrs. Whalley and Newdegate : — -We have had a terrible time in Parliament this week, all along of the Pope and the Jesuits. You can scarcely imagine how terrified we have been. There was Mr. Whalley in the first place — Mr. Newdegate, you know, hus often said that Mr. Whalley was himself a Jesuit in disguise, and was employed by Father Beckx for the express purpose of bringing Protestantism into contempt; but then, for all we know, it may be Newdegate who is the Jesuit, and Whalley may be the real Protestant — there was Whalley, however, who got up on Thursday night and called Mr. Disraeli's attention to the fact, that under the Act of George IV. the presence of a Jesuit in England was a high crime and misdemeanor, and that any Jesuit attempting to dwell here was under that law to be arrested, despoiled of all his possessions, if he had any, imprisoned for life or exiled. Notwithstanding that this law had never been repealed, continued Whalley, the kingdom swarmed with Jesuits ; and he wished to know what was to be done about it. Mr. Disraeli , • made a very curious reply. I don't know exactly what to make of Mr. Disraeli ; sometimes he seems very wise, and then, again, he appears to be exceedingly foolish. It is quite true, said he, that the Act of George IV. forbids any member of the Society of Jesus to live in England j it is quite true that a considerable number of Jesuits have lived in England ever since that law was passed, and that many are now livitjg here. The law was passed fifty years ago ; since then we have had many governments, but none of them troubled itself about the Jesuits. The law against them, however, is not obsolete; oh no ! it is in full force, and we are quite prepared to enforce it if we should think it necessary. This reply — which Mr. Whalley probably considered a Jesuitical one-^-did not satisfy the member for Peterborough, and the next night he made another attempt to get at the Jesuits. " I ask the Home Secretary," he exclaimed, "if he is aware that vast numbers of Jesuits have lately arrived in England, with the avowed purpose of subverting our Protestant institutions, and reducing us to the yoke of Papacy ; and I ask him, in view of these facts, whether he will not put in force the laws against them ? He may be all the more willing to do so when I tell him that 300,000 people believe that the conviction of Sir Roger Tichborne (Arthur Orton) was brought about by a Jesuit conspiracy." The Home Secretary had the bad taste'not to like Mr. Whalley, and he replied yery curtly. He did not know that the Jesuits were plotting the subversion of our institutions ; he thought, if they were, that they might save themselves much troublej for they would not succeed ; and as regard to the convict Orton he would only say that he would not answer any more of Mr. Whalley's ridiculous questions concerning that person.