Another Bogus 'Oath '

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XXXV, Issue 5, 31 January 1907, Page 10

Another Bogus ' Oath '

Once upon a time (so ran the Grecian story) the morose and angry Ajax contended "with Ulysses for the conquering armor of Achilles. The Greek princes deci-. ded in favor of Ulysses. Thereupon Ajax stormed and raged and fumed like a Vesuvius. On his way from the council" hall he. came across a flock of inoffensive sheep, browsing harmlessly by the roadside. In his blind fury he fell upon them, imagining them to be the princes who had given the award against him. Then he turned his blade against himself, and died a suicide. * - In the recent Federal elections, the - morose Australian Ajax (to wit, .the ' yellow ' section of the community) strove with nuighit and main -to "capture the armor of Achilles^to secure for themselves the place of power in the supreme councils of the Commonwealth. But the Greek princes (that is," the body, of the electors) awarded it' elsewhere. Thereupon, an" anigry Ajax of the ' yellow ' men (the Grand Master of "the Victorian Orangemen) strode out with a tempest in his brain. He came across a useful and inoffensive Catholic benefit society— the Ancient Order of Hiberi*ans. Fancying in his. paroxysm that in striking them he smote the authors of the adverse award, he fell upon them and mauled anil clubbed them with a hideous accusation. Said accusation was this: that the members of "the Ancient Order of Hibernians take a diabolical oath that winds up with this screech from the Abyss :— ' And in revenge for the sufferings of ' our forefathers and protection of our rights, I further solemnly swear to aid as best 1 can in exterminating and extirpating all Protestants and Jieretics out -of Ireland or elsewhere ; to hunt, pursue, shoot, and destroy all Protestant or heretic landlords, proprietors, or employers, and also to hunt, shoot, pu "sue, and destroy all landlords or proprietors belonging to the Church of Rome should he -or they evict his or theii' tenants from the house, land, home, or holding of theirs.' Fee-faw-fum ! ' • The first part of this, absurd and clumsy fabrication is palpably built upon and probably intended as an offset to the oath ,' to^ exterminate the Catholics of Ireland ', which. (according to Plowden and such Protestant authorities as Lords Gosford and Holland, Henry Grattan, William Sampson, Arthur O'Connor, and sundry other authorities, including some eye-witnesses) was taken by early Orangemen during the first reign of terror organised by the lodges. (2) The sham ' oath ' attributed to the Ancient Order of Hibernians was originally attributed, we bjelieve, to.'the Rib.bonjmieh. (3) 1 No such oath was ever taVeii by the Ribbonmen. - And - .no oath of any kind has ever been taken by the Ancient Order . otf Hibernians, or by any Catholic benefit society. (4) The • oath ' given above has the evidence of its fraudulent character lying as manifest all over it as maxphweeds upon a swamp. It opens, for instance, with the assertion of three favorite Orange calumnies: (a) that Catholics are fiee to commit perjury as they please ; (b) to disregard ail oaths of allegiance to any Protestant authority, and (c) to massacre any person, whether Catholic or 'heretic', that' happens to stand in their way. The clumsy" forger of this ' oath \ also forgot an elementary precept of caution when- he used the common Protestant designation, • the Church of Rome '—a title which Catholics in English-speaking countries prac^ tically never employ;. . (5) The publication of the rules : of the Ancient Order of Hibernians, and official disclaimers of that clumsily fabricated • oath ', settle the story spread by the Grand Master of the Victorian Orangemen, on the ' authority ' of a rabbit-brained

-fanatic in the Home Land. This resuscitated ' oath ' niay enjoy a short run, like* the Jesuit ' oath ', and the bishops' ' oath ', and other such interesting- fables of the Rawhead-and-Blooa'y-Bones school. .In due course we shall probably find that it will be used on New Zealand platforms tq scare old women of both sexes. In that case, our readers are both forewarned and fore-, armed. The disseminators of" this gross and palpable fabrication have, like the disappointed and raging Ajax, x committed social suicide. On the literary side, they de^ serve to take rank with . Vlllly Lilly, ' the English Merlin ' (as he called himself), who in 1644 and 1645 published (says Samuel Butler; ' the art of discovering all that never was and never will be '.