THE CHURCH IN IRELAND DURING THE REIGN OF THE STUARTS(1604-1689)See bibliography, chap. vii.-ix. /Calendar of State Papers, Ireland/ (James I.), 5 vols., 1872-80. Idem (Charles I.), 5 vols.
/Calendar of the Clarendon Papers/, 2 vols., 1869-72. Carte, /History of the Life of James, Duke of Ormonde/ (1610-88), 3vols., 1736. French, /Historical Works/, 2 vols., 1846. /Report on the Franciscan MSS./, i., 1906. Russell-Prendergast, /Report on the Carte Papers in the Bodleian Library/, 1871. Gilbert, /Contemporary History of Affairs in Ireland/ (1641-52), 1879-80.
Bagwell, /Ireland under the Stuarts/, 2 vols., 1909. Prendergast, /Cromwellian Settlement of Ireland/, 2 ed., 1875. Lecky, /History of Ireland in the Eighteenth Century/, new imp., 1913. Coffey, /O'Neill and Ormond/, 1914. Dunlop, /Ireland under the Commonwealth/, 2 vols., 1913. Murray, /Revolutionary Ireland and its Settlement/, 2 vols., 1911. Boulger, /The Battle of the Boyne/, 1911. Burke, /The Irish Priests in the Penal Times/ (1660-1760), 1914.
The news of the death of Queen Elizabeth and of the accession of James I. came as a welcome relief to the great body of the Catholics of Ireland. As the son of Mary Queen of Scots, and in a sense, the descendant of the Irish Kings of Scotland[1] he was regarded with favour both within and without the Pale. While King of Scotland he had been in communication with the Pope, with the Catholic sovereigns of the Continent, and with O'Neill, and even after he had been proclaimed in London he promised some of the leading Catholic lords that they might expect at least toleration. Without, however, waiting for any such promises the Catholics in the leading cities of the East and South made open profession of their religion. In Kilkenny, Thomastown, Waterford, Wexford, Cashel, Cork, Limerick, etc., they took possession of the churches, abolished the Protestant service wherever it had been introduced, and restored the Mass. James White, Vicar-general of Waterford, made himself especially conspicuous as the leader in this movement in the south-eastern portion of Ireland.[2]
Lord Mountjoy was in a difficult position. He was uncertain as to the religious policy of the king, but in the end he determined to suppress the Catholic movement by force. He marched South to Kilkenny and thence to Waterford, where he had an interview with Dr. White.
Everywhere the churches were restored to the Protestants, though it was hinted that the Mass might still be celebrated privately as in the days of Elizabeth. In Cork the condition of affairs was much more serious, and it was necessary to bring up the guns from Haulbowline before the mayor and citizens could be induced to submit. Reports came in from all sides that the country was swarming with Jesuits and seminary priests, that they were stirring up the people to join hands with the King of Spain, and to throw off their allegiance to James I.
These rumours were without foundation, as is shown by the fact that most of the towns and cities in Leinster and Munster which were noted as specially Catholic, had not stirred a finger to help O'Neill in his war against Elizabeth. But they were put in circulation to prejudice the mind of King James against his Irish Catholic subjects, and to wean him away from the policy of toleration which he was said to favour. Loftus, Archbishop of Dublin, and Jones, Bishop of Meath, hastened to warn the king against a policy of toleration. They threw the whole blame of the late war on the Jesuits and seminary priests, and cast doubts upon the loyalty of the Catholic noblemen of the Pale.
They called upon his Majesty to make it clear "even in the morning of his reign," that he was ready "to maintain the true worship and religion of Jesus Christ," to let the people understand that "he will never permit and suffer that which in his godly zeal he so much abhors, to devise some means of preventing the plots and aims of Jesuits and seminary priests, who "come daily from beyond the seas, teaching openly that a king wanting the Pope's confirmation is not a lawful king," to send over some "learned and discreet preachers" to the principal cities and towns, and to compel the people "by some moderate co-actions to come to church to hear their sermons and exhortations."[3]
As a means of spreading the new gospel amongst the Irish people it was recommended that "a learned ministry be planted, and that the abuses of the clergy be reformed;" that all bishops, Jesuits, seminary priests, and friars should be banished from the kingdom, that no lawyers be admitted to the bar or to the privy council unless they attended the Protestant service, and that all sheriffs, mayors, justices of the peace, recorders, judges, and officials be forced to take the oath of supremacy. Loftus and Jones insisted, furthermore, that Catholic parents should be forbidden to send their children to Douay and Rheims, and should be compelled to send them to the Protestant diocesan schools. They reported that although the Bishop of Meath had opened a school in Trim at great expense to himself, only six scholars attended, and that when the teachers began to use prayers in the school and to show themselves desirous of bringing their pupils to church, the pupils departed, and the teachers, though graduates of the University, were left without any work to do.[4]
