ll is said, the dominant temper of
the man was love. That, and that alone, was at the very centre of his
being, and by that influence everything that came from him was
irradiated and warmed. He had, as an Irish patriot, unwavering faith,
unquenchable hope; he had also, and above all, the charity which gave
to every other faculty and attainment the supreme, the most enduring
grace.

T. W. ROLLESTON.

---------------------------------------------------------------
[1] This work, with the inclusion of the full text of the more
important of the Acts of the Parliament of James II., and with an
Introduction by Sir Charles Gavan Duffy, was reprinted from the
_Dublin Monthly Magazine_ of 1843 by Mr. Fisher Unwin in 1891
as the first volume of the 'New Irish Library.' It is now out of
print.

[2] Mr. Mongan's School on Lower Mount Street.

[3] "Life of Davis," p. 286.

[4] "Life of Davis," pp. 218, 219.

I. The Irish Parliament of James II.

PREFACE.

This enquiry is designed to rescue eminent men and worthy acts from
calumnies which were founded on the ignorance and falsehoods of the Old
Whigs, who never felt secure until they had destroyed the character as
well as the liberty of Ireland.

Irish oppression never could rely on mere physical force for any length
of time. Our enormous military resources, and the large proportion of
"fighting men," or men who love fighting, among our people, prohibit
it. It was ever necessary to divide us by circulating extravagant
stories of our crimes and our disasters, in order to poison the wells
of brotherly love and patriotism in our hearts, that so many of us
might range ourselves under the banner of our oppressor.

Calumny lives chiefly on the past and future; it corrupts history and
croaks dark prophecies. Never, from TYRCONNELL'S rally down to
O'CONNELL'S revival of the Emancipation struggle--never, from the
summons of the Dungannon Convention to the Corporation Debate on
Repeal, has a single bold course been proposed for Ireland, that folly,
disorder, and disgrace has not been foreboded. Never has any great deed
been done here that the alien Government did not, as soon as the facts
became historical, endeavour to blacken the honour of the statesmen,
the wisdom of the legislators, or the valour of the soldiers who
achieved it.

One of the favourite texts of these apostles of misrule was the Irish
Government in King JAME