The History of Ireland: 17th Century. Bagwell Richard

      Italy.

      Bacon’s advice.

What we mean by toleration was nowhere understood in the early part of the seventeenth century. Even Bacon, who admired the edict of Nantes, which had not wiped out the memory of St. Bartholomew, had no idea of abrogating the Elizabethan penal code. Henry IV.’s famous edict was an exception; it was one of the kind that proves the rule, for he saw no way of securing the French Protestants but by giving them a kind of local autonomy which could not last. Rochelle was an impossibility in a modern state, and when that frail bulwark was destroyed persecution gradually resumed its sway. Of Spain, the birthplace and fixed home of the Inquisition, it is unnecessary to speak. In Germany neither party practised any real toleration. In Italy Spanish interests were dominant, and Elizabeth died an excommunicated Queen. Clement VIII. abstained from treating her successor in the same way, but he had hopes by mildness to obtain better terms for the faithful in England. Both in England and Ireland any intention of forcing men’s consciences was always disclaimed, while outward conformity was insisted on. And in the case of the Roman Catholics, who took their orders from a foreign and hostile power, it was really very difficult to say exactly how much belonged to Cæsar. Bacon was more liberal than anyone else, but his ideas fell very far short of what is now generally accepted. In Ireland, he advised Cecil, after the Spaniards had been foiled at Kinsale, ‘a toleration of religion (for a time not definite), except it be in some principal towns and precincts, after the manner of some French edicts, seemeth to me to be a matter warrantable by religion, and in policy of absolute necessity. And the hesitation in this point I think hath been a great casting back of the affairs there. Neither if any English Papist or recusant shall for liberty of his conscience transfer his person, family, and fortunes thither do I hold it a matter of danger, but expedient to draw on undertaking and to further population. Neither if Rome will cozen itself, by conceiving it may be some degree to the like toleration in England, do I hold it a matter of any moment, but rather a good mean to take off the fierceness and eagerness of the humour of Rome, and to stay further excommunications or interdictions for Ireland.’ Bacon saw the difficulty clearly, and perhaps he saw the working solution, but to persevere steadily in such a course was not in James’s nature, though Chichester might conceivably have done so if he had had a free hand.[26]

      Barnewall and Chichester.

      Barnewall puzzles the Council.

      Barnewall sent to England.

      Victory of Barnewall

      Sir Patrick Barnewall was committed prisoner to the Castle on December 2, 1605. ‘Well,’ said he, ‘we must endure as we have endured many other things, and especially the miseries of the late war.’ ‘No, sir,’ answered Chichester, ‘we have endured the misery of the war, we have lost our blood and our friends, and have indeed endured extreme miseries to suppress the late rebellion, whereof your priests, for whom you make petition, and your wicked religion, was the principal cause.’ In writing to Salisbury afterwards Sir Patrick attributed the invention of the mandates to Chief Justice Ley, but it is much more likely that Davies was their author. After an imprisonment of three months, Barnewall was again brought before the Irish Council, and argued soundly in maintaining that recusancy was only an offence in so far as it was made one by statute, and that therefore all prosecution of it except that prescribed by Act of Parliament was illegal. At a further examination when the Chancellor, who was a bishop and ought to have known better, spoke of the King’s religion, Barnewall saw his advantage and exclaimed ‘That is a profane speech.’ He was not sent to England till near the end of April, and at the end of May the English Government had not yet found time to attend to him. At first he was allowed to live under restraint at his own lodgings in the Strand, but was afterwards sent to the Tower, probably with the idea of making an impression upon the public mind in Ireland. It was found impossible to answer his arguments, and the Privy Council asked the Irish Government for information as to the ‘law or precedent for the course taken in issuing precepts under the Great Seal to compel men to come to church.’ They admitted that such authority was ‘as yet unknown to them,’ but rather sarcastically supposed that the Lord Deputy and Council were better informed. The Irish Government were acting entirely by prerogative; but several of the judges in England pronounced the mandates not contrary to precedent or authority. Barnewall was induced to make some sort of submission more than a year after his original arrest. Being called upon to make one in more regular form he refused, and was then sent to the Fleet prison for a month. Having signed a bond to appear within five days of his arrival, he was returned to Ireland at the beginning of March, 1607, and Chichester at once saw that no progress had been made.

      The Mandates are abandoned.

Barnewall refused to make any submission in Dublin, and in the end it was found necessary to drop all proceedings against him. His detention in London was really a triumph, for the Irish recusants regarded him as their agent, and subscribed largely for his support. Waterford contributed 32l. and the collection was general all over Ireland. He gained in fact a complete victory, and such progress as Brouncker had made in procuring outward conformity was at once arrested. The mandates were never again resorted to.[27]

      FOOTNOTES:

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      [17] Irish Statutes, 2 Eliz. chaps. i. and ii. James I.’s Apology for the Oath of Allegiance against the two breves of Pope Paulus Quintus, &c., in his Works, 1616 (the oath is at p. 250).

[18] Enclosure in letter of John Byrd to Devonshire, September 8, 1603. Archbishop of Dublin and Bishop of Meath to the Privy Council, March 5, 1604. Davies to Cecil, April 19 and December 8. Bishop of Ossory to the Deputy and Council, June 8, 1604. Chief Justice Saxey to Cranbourne, 1604, No. 397. Hogan’s Life of H. Fitzsimon, pp. 58 sqq.

[19] Proclamation of July 4, 1605; Davies to Salisbury, No. 603 in Cal. Lords of the Council to Chichester, January 24, 1606; Chichester to Salisbury and to Chichester, February 26; Roger Wilbraham’s Diary, in vol. x. of the Camden Miscellany.

[20] Davies to Cecil, December 8, 1604, January 6, 1605; Saxey to Cecil, 1604, No. 397; the King to Chichester, June 27, 1605; his proclamation against toleration, July 4; Cornwallis to the Privy Council, April 19, 1608, in Winwood.

[21] The Case of Præmunire in Sir John Davies’s Reports, London, 1628. Lalor was arrested in March 1605–6, and finally convicted early in the following year.

[22] Lord Deputy and Council to the Privy Council, December 5, 1605; Chichester to Salisbury, December 7.

[23] Brouncker to Cecil, August 23 and October 17, 1604; Salisbury to Brouncker, March 3, 1606; Brouncker’s letter of September 12; Return of fines imposed 4 James I. printed in Irish Cal. ii. 41; Brouncker to the Privy Council, November 18; Chichester to Salisbury, December 1, 1606, and February 10, 1607; The King to Chichester, July 16, 1607; Privy Council to Chichester, January 17, 1608–9; Davies to Salisbury, June 10, 1609.

[24] Brouncker to Cecil, August 23, 1604; observation by Sir John Davies, May 4, 1606; Lord Deputy and Council to the Privy Council, September 12, 1606; Brouncker to the Privy Council, February 10, 1606–7. For Connaught