As it is my intention to bring the Church Establishment of Ireland before the House of Commons in the ensuing session, I shall be obliged by your sending me any authentic accounts of the value of the Church property, i.e., of the bishops, deans, and chapters of any diocese, that I may lay it before the public as completely as possible.
The cause is so good a one that I wish to be in moderation, and within bounds, as exaggeration always hurts our cause.
The system of tithes ought to be entirely abolished, as every attempt, like that of the last session, to bolster up so preposterous and a bad system must tender to render the change too violent when it shall be made; and the late conduct of some of the church militant will only hasten the event.
Until a radical change takes place in the Church establishment and Church property, there will be no peace in your wretched country, and every aid to affect these changes will be a real benefit to the country.
| WRITING THE WORK ON SALVATOR ROSA. | 181 |
To expose these evils of the system of tithes as it has been working in the last year, it would be of great use to me if you could cut out of any newspapers all the cases that can be depended upon, where burnings, murders, the interposition of the military, the destruction of cattle, &c., &c., have taken place on account of the tithe system, that they may be brought into array at once; also the conduct of such of the clergy as have taken the law into their own hands, or have behaved harshly so as to produce disturbance or mischief.
Can any account be obtained of the number of persons who have been murdered, hanged, and transported in the last year in Ireland on account of the tithes’ disputes?
All these, with documents to enable me to prove them, will be most valuable in forwarding the object I have in view, an exposure to effect a complete change.
I shall want as much information of that kind as you can collect for me before the middle of January, to be prepared to agitate the subject by the middle of February. Callous as the ministers are to proceedings that disgrace the country, and regardless as they are to the misery produced in Ireland by their conduct, and indifferent as they are also to the enormous charge on Great Britain to keep a whole nation under military power, I am confident that nothing will rouse the public indignation so much as a proper exposure of all these evils and their causes.
If you will zealously aid me, you will, I trust, aid the best interests of your own country; and in your desire to do that, I hope there cannot be a doubt.
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I shall, therefore, expect your early attention to my requests, whilst
PS.—I this day delivered to the charge of Mr. Felix Fitzpatrick a copy of Mills’ Essays on Government, on Jurisprudence, and the Liberty of the Press, of which we have printed one thousand for circulation; and I hope you will approve the sound doctrines they contain.
