CHURCH OF IRELAND

Of the first introduction of the Church into Ireland we have no authentic records; nor is it nece ary to search for them, since, of the present Church, the founder, under God , was St. Patrick, in the fifth century. From him it is that the present clergy, the reformed clergy, and they only , have their succe ion, and through him from the apostles themselves. That, by a regular series of consecrations and ordinations, the succe ion from Patrick and Palladius, and the first Irish mi ionaries, was kept up until the reign of Queen Elizabeth, our opponents, the Irish Papists, will allow. The question, therefore, is whether that succe ion was at that time lost. The onus proband i rests with our opponents, and we defy them to prove that such was the case. It is a well-known fact, that of all the countries of Europe, there was not one in which the proce of the Reformation was carried on so regularly, so canonically, so quietly, as it was in Ireland. Carte, the biographer of Ormond, having observed that the Popish schism did not commence in England until the twelfth year of Queen Elizabeth’s reign, but that for eleven years those who most favoured the pretensions of the pope conformed to the reformed Catholic Church of England, remarks, “The case was much the same in Ireland, where the bishops complied with the Reformation, and the Roman Catholics (meaning those who afterwards became Roman , instead of remaining reformed Catholics) resorted in general to the parish churches in which the English service was used, until the end of Queen Elizabeth’s reign.” It is here stated that the bishops of the Church of Ireland, that is, as the Papists will admit, the then succe ors of St. Patrick and his suffragans, those who had a right to reform the Church of Ireland, consented to the Reformation; and that, until the end of Queen Elizabeth’s reign, (and she reigned above forty-four years,) there was no pretended Church, under the dominion of the pope, opposed to the true Catholic Church, as is unfortunately now the case. The existing clergy of the Church of Ireland, whether we regard their order or their mi ion, and consequently the Church itself, are the only legitimate succe ors of those by whom that Church was founded. That in the Church of Ireland, as well as in the Church of England, corruptions in doctrine as well as in practice prevailed before the Reformation, and that the pope of Rome gradually usurped over it an authority directly contrary to one of the canons of a general council of the Church Universal, (that of Ephesus,) we fully admit. But that usurpation was resisted and renounced, and those corruptions removed and provided against at the Reformation. After the English Reformation the Irish Church received the English liturgy, in conformity with the principle now profe ed by the English government, though not always consistently or fairly carried out, of promoting a close ecclesiastical unity between the two countries. Articles of Religion, of a Calvin is tic tendency, were pa ed by the Irish convocation of 1615, but in 1635 the English Articles were received and approved by a canon of convocation, and have ever since been subscribed by Irish clergymen. In 1662 the revised Prayer Book of England was adopted by the Irish convocation. At the time of the union of the two kingdoms, the two Churches were united under the title of the United Church of England and Ireland. Doubts have been expre ed as to what this union means. It does not mean union in doctrine. The Churches were in full communion in every respect before; and still are, except in a few particulars, merely circumstantial. It does not mean distinct synodical rights, for the two English provinces have their convocations distinct one from the other, and the decrees of the one do not, of nece ity, bind the other. The union is national and political. When the two kingdoms became politically and legislatively one, the two Churches, in conformity with the ancient and avowed principles of English government, were declared to be identified. This identification was solemnly declared by the sovereign and parliament of both countries, as an indispensable and fundamental article of union, a erted by the spiritual lords of each; without the slightest reclamation on the part of the clergy or laity. Now this declaration of legislative union is in fact a solemn declaration on the part of the state of identification of interests. If each of the English provinces of the United Church claim synodical rights, a right of advising when the great interests of the Church are concerned, the claim of the Irish provinces of the same Church are equally strong, are strictly parallel. If the property and rights of the English clergy are to be protected, the Irish clergy have as strong a claim to protection. How far the avowed principle has been acted upon, it is not difficult to determine. The property of the Irish clergy has been dealt with upon principles altogether different from those which still protected the property of their English brethren. No provision whatever was made for perpetuating the Irish convocations, which are still in abeyance, even as to outward form, though formerly they had as defined a system as in England. (See Convocation .) In an age, when the multiplication of bishops has been urged, and generally admitted as nece ary, the Church in Ireland has been disheartened by a retrograde movement. For, in opposition to the earnest reclamation of her clergy, ten of her bishops were, by a very tyrannical act of the state, suppre ed; and two of her archiepiscopal sees (Cashel and Tuam) reduced to the rank of suffragans; and this to meet a mere fiscal exigency, to provide for the Church Rates; for which, be it observed, the clergy of Ireland, whose revenues have been in many other ways legislatively curtailed, are now taxed. The words of the fifth article of the Union with Ireland are these: “That it be the fifth article of Union, that the Churches of England and Ireland, as now by law established, be united into one Protestant Episcopal Church, to be called, The United Church of England and Ireland ; and that the doctrine, worship, discipline, and government of the said United Church shall be, and shall remain in full force for ever, as the same are now by law established for the Church of England; and that the continuance and preservation of the said United Church, as the established Church of England and Ireland, shall be deemed and taken to be an e ential and fundamental part of the Union.” The Church in Ireland had till lately four archbishops: 1. Armagh, with seven suffragans, viz. Meath, Down, ‡Dromore, Derry, Kilmore, ‡Raphoe, and ‡Clogher. 2. Dublin, with three suffragans, viz. ‡Kildare, ‡Ferns, and O ory. 3. Cashel, with five suffragans, viz. Limerick, Cork, ‡Cloyne, Killaloe, and ‡Water ford. 4. Tuam, with three suffragans, viz. ‡Clonfert, ‡Elphin, and ‡Killala. [Those which are marked thus ‡ are now suppre ed.] Formerly there had been 32 bishops in all; but the sees had become so impoverished that it became nece ary from time to time to unite some of these to others, (but for reason and under sanction far different from those which influenced the late innovations,) so that in the 17th century they were much the same as stated above. The bishops of Meath and Kildare had precedence over the other bishops.—See Jebb’s Charge to the Clergy of Limerick .