ssary
it was for a fruitful campaign on their own behalf to enlarge their
basis, and enlist the sympathies of hitherto excluded fellow-subjects.

It may seem strange that the first beginnings of successful endeavour
should have been made on behalf not of the "common Protestantism," but
of Roman Catholics. But, as Mr. Lecky has shown, the Presbyterians had
been greatly depressed and distracted, while the Roman Catholics had now
a strong position in the commerce of the country, and in Dublin
knocked, as it were, at the very doors of the Parliament. There may also
have been an apprehension of republican sentiments among the Protestants
of the north, from which the Roman Catholics were known to be free. Not
many years, however, passed before the softening and harmonizing
effects, which naturally flow from a struggle for liberty, warmed the
sentiment of the House in favour of the Presbyterians.

A Bill was passed by the Irish Parliament in 1778, which greatly
mitigated the stringency of the penal laws. Moreover, in its preamble
was recited, as a ground for this legislation, that for "a long series
of years" the Roman Catholics had exhibited an "uniform peaceable
behaviour." In doing and saying so much, the Irish Parliament virtually
bound itself to do more.[88] In this Bill was contained a clause which
repealed the Sacramental Test, and thereby liberated the Presbyterians
from disqualification. But the Bill had to pass the ordeal of a review
in England, and there the clause was struck out. The Bill itself, though
mutilated, was wisely passed by a majority of 127 to 89. Even in this
form it excited the enthusiastic admiration of Burke.[89] Nor were the
Presbyterians forgotten at the epoch when, in 1779-80, England, under
the pressure of her growing difficulties, made large commercial
concessions to Ireland. The Dublin Parliament renewed the Bill for the
removal of the Sacramental Test. And it was carried by the Irish
Parliament in the very year which witnessed in London the disgraceful
riots of Lord George Gordon, and forty-eight years before the Imperial
Parliament conceded, on this side the Channel, any similar relief. Other
contemporary signs bore witness to the growth of toleration; for the
Volunteers, founded in 1778, and originally a Protestant body, after a
time received Roman Catholics into their ranks. These impartial
proceedings are all the more honourable to Irish sentiment in general,
because Lord Charlemont, its