Page:My Life in Two Hemispheres, volume 2.djvu/116

 to decide in all causes in the last resort. As a loyal and obedient son of the Church, he and some members of Parliament were resolved to bring before the Holy See, for its official decision, the question whether the honest clergy of Ireland were to be silenced by authority and their mouths closed for ever. What the clergy of Ossory, what the clergy of other dioceses in Ireland, might consider it their duty to do he was not in a condition to say; but, as regards laymen and politicians, before a month was over some of them would cross the sea and find themselves, with the blessing of God, beneath the shadow of the Vatican.

If the final decision of the Church closed the mouths of honest priests, and upheld pledge-breakers, place-beggars, and all those who made politics a dishonest game, he, speaking in the name of some there present, but speaking above all his own conviction, would declare that he saw no other course for honest and sane men to take but to wash their hands of public affairs altogether, and to abandon all hope of protecting the rights and interests of Ireland in the Parliament of Great Britain.

At the public dinner which followed the meeting I reiterated the declaration which Lucas had made on our behalf. I had come there, I said, almost without visiting my own home, because the stroke aimed at Father Keeffe, which was the first open exercise of a policy long pursued in secret, was one fatal to the people's interest. Whether the Bishop of Ossory had exceeded his legitimate authority I would not undertake to say; but of one thing I was certain, honourable men would decline to maintain a contest with bigots and oppressors in the House of Commons if they were to be betrayed at home by bishops of their own Church, and, for my part, I would resign my seat in Parliament as an emphatic protest.

The second county meeting took place at Thurles, where, though the archbishop was a partisan of Dr. Cullen's, sixty-two priests had signed the requisition, and twenty thousand persons were said to be present. George Henry Moore took sides decisively with his colleagues at Callan. Lucas started for Rome and was to be followed by a lay and an ecclesiastical mission as soon as the necessary arrangements could be made.