Page:A letter to the Right Hon. Chichester Fortescue, M.P. on the state of Ireland.djvu/83

 They do not ask, like the Scotch Parliament of 1690, to acquire exclusive privileges for their own Church; they do not, like the Scotch of 1697, propose that the Protestant Episcopal Church of England should be accounted in Ireland a Dissenting sect, while their own Church is Established; what they ask is, that the four millions and a half of Roman Catholics should be placed on an equality with the 700,000 Protestants of the Episcopal Church.

Surely there is nothing arrogant, nothing defying, nothing seditious or revolutionary in this request.

It says, in effect, to the Parliament of the United Kingdom—If in your wisdom you think it right to abolish Church Endowments, let us have the benefit of that principle; if, on the other hand, you decide to maintain Church Endowments, let the principle of Equality obtain for our faith, in the revenues set apart for this purpose by the State, that share to which our population justly entitles us.

I will now, therefore, state roughly the consequences of adopting the principle of Equality in regard to the three Churches of Ireland.

In the first place the Protestant Episcopal Church would cease to be an Established Church. Established Churches are immediately and closely connected with the State; Endowed Churches only acknowledge the State as the Power by whose authority they receive their revenues. The Protestant Episcopal Church in Ireland, therefore, in ceasing to be Established, would cease to have its archbishops and bishops sitting in the House of Lords; Parliament might pro-