Untitled

New Zealand Tablet, 2 August 1917, Page 23

“As I read the history of the Orange Society,” said the Rev. Dr. Rentoul, of Melbourne, writing in the Argus, “a sense of horror came over me. Killen (the Presbyterian historian), and Green (in his History of the English People) are quite enough to show that from the tragic day in 1795, on which 48 Catholics lay dead, and the first Orange Lodge was formed, the history of this institution, identified as it is with the worst features of the landlord system in Ireland, and with one rigid form of Protestant ascendancy, and (excepting a few instances) opposing every movement of reform, and becoming a means of civil strife and blood-, shed, could be no longer even approved by me by my presence at any of its gatherings.” “Of all institutions in the world,” continues Fighting Larry, who in previous years had spoken freely at Orange gatherings, “the so-called Loyal Orange Institution which had no more connection with William of Orange than it had with the Angel Gabriel—should be the last to assert its loyalty.’ These are scathing words from an able Presbyterian clergyman, who has no predilections for Catholics, whom he has time and again, even to the present day, attacked in the Melbourne newspapers.