e 'great, glorious, and free,' if its Roman
Catholic people were to cease all efforts for Repeal, and turn good
Protestants. But the _Herald_ does greatly err not knowing human nature
and the source of Irish evils. It is not by substituting Protestantism
for Romanism that those evils are to be cured. Were every Romanist in
Ireland at once to turn 'good Protestant,' their political emancipation
would be far off as ever. Protestantism everywhere, like Romanism
everywhere, is 'a political system, and a wicked political system, for
it regards only the exercise of power, and neglects utterly the duty of
improvement.'

Religion is the curse of Ireland. To the rival churches of that country
may be traced nearly all the oppressions suffered by its people, who
never can be materially improved till purged of their faith in priests.
When that salutary work shall be accomplished, Ireland will indeed be 'a
nation' in the secure enjoyment of political liberty. The priest-ridden
may talk of freedom, but can never secure it; for, as truly said by one
of our most admired poets--

Tis man's base grovelling nature makes the priest,
Who always rides a superstitious beast.

And he is a poor politician who expects to see political liberty
achieved or enjoyed by nations made up of 'base, grovelling' specimens
of human nature.

What then can be thought of the first-rate reformers before alluded to,
who are going to emancipate every body without the least offence to any
body's superstition? It should be borne in memory that other people are
superstitious as well as the Irish, and that the churches of all
countries are as much parts of 'a wicked political system' as are the
churches of Ireland. The judges of our own country frequently remind us
that its laws have a religious sanction; nay they assure us Christianity
is part and parcel of those laws. Do we not know that orthodox
Christianity means Christianity as by law established? And can any one
fail to perceive that such a religion must needs be political? The
cunning few, who make a market of delusion, and esteem nothing apart
from their own aggrandisement, are quite aware that the civil and
criminal law of England is intimately associated with Christianity--they
publicly proclaim their separation impossible, except at the cost of
destruction to both. They are sagacious enough to perceive that a people
totally untrammelled by the fears, the prejudices, and the wickedn