r own Government, which wanted to make them conform to the Irish
Episcopal Church. In the whole history of Irish misgovernment there is
nothing more stupid than this persecution of Irish Presbyterians. But,
indeed, we may not blame our forefathers for this stupidity.
Persecution of this kind belonged to the times. It seems to us
inconceivably stupid that men should be exiled because they would not
acknowledge the authority of a bishop, but, out of Maryland, there was
nowhere any real religious toleration; the dream of every sect was to
trample down and to destroy all other sects. Our people in Ireland
were no worse than the people of Salem and Boston. Religious
toleration was not yet understood. Therefore, it was only playing the
game according to the laws of the game when the United Kingdom threw
away tens of thousands--the strongest, the most able, the most
industrious, the most loyal--of her Irish subjects, because they would
not change one sect for another; and retained the Roman Catholics,
hereditary rebels, who were numerically too strong to be turned out.

All these things are perfectly well known to the American reader. But
is it also well known to the American reader--has he ever asked
himself--how these things affected and impressed the mind of England?

In this way. The Land of Romance was no longer the fable land where a
dozen Protestant soldiers, headed by the invincible Dragon, could
drive out a whole garrison of Catholic Spaniards and sack a town. It
had ceased to be another Ophir and a richer Golconda; but it was the
Land of Religious Freedom. The Church of England and Ireland, by law
established, had no power across the ocean. America, to the
Nonconformist of the seventeenth century, was a haven and a refuge
ever open in case of need. The history of Nonconformity shows the
vital necessity of such a refuge. The very existence of free America
gave to the English Nonconformist strength and courage. Such a
persecution as that of the Irish Presbyterians became impossible when
it had been once demonstrated that, should the worst happen, the
persecuted religionists would escape by voluntary exile.

That the spirit of persecution long survived is proved by the
lingering among us down to our own days of the religious disabilities.
Within the memory of living men, no one outside the Church of England
could be educated at a public school; could take a degree at Oxford or
Cambridge; could hold a scholarship or a