fact as it is extreme in rigour, I should not feel warranted to expostulate in this manner with your lordship upon the injustice you have done me. Of your great power, my lord, of your pre-eminent dignity, I am thoroughly sensible: these are the very circum stances which in my mind aggravate the injury I complain of; and therefore far from deterring, they encourage me rather to present myself with confidence before you. To redress wrongs is the peculiar providence of your lordship's exalted station. We all know, my lord, that if the subject were aggrieved even by the King, who can do no wrong, your lordship is empowered to cancel his letters patent, if founded upon untrue suggestions: I must then persuade myself that being at least as much inclined as you are warranted to do such act of justice, you will be equally ready to cancel your own severe sentence upon me, when your lordship shall have considered the extent of the injury, and shall have detected the misinfor mation that grounds it. In your letter to the Earl of Fingall, your lordship would convince that Roman Catholic nobleman how little faith is due to Roman Catholics in their professions of loyalty, by representing to him that I, a Roman Catholic bishop, have been treating with pointed disrespect those of my clergy who in the year 1798, had saved the lives of loval men; and in honouring as a martyr, with insult to the offended justice of the laws, a priest supposed to be deeply implicated in the rebellion, and permitted to return from transportation through the mere indulgence of government. This sentence, my lord, will, by easy implication, be thought to insinuate that, beside being a traitrous, a perjured hypocrite, I am also an abettor of murder-a sanguinary monster under sheep's clothing of Episcopal Consecration, who, while I preach the loyalty I have sworn, am sanctioning by my conduct the murder of loyal men; and promoting as far as in me lies, a rebellious spirit among my clergy, by reserv.. ing my chief attentions for such of them as were said to be guilty of rebellion. A dreadful insinuation, indeed; deriving multiplied effect from your lordship's character and station! It would bear heavily upon me, my Jord, had it been no more than a sudden explosion barsting from an ordinary noblem n in the heat of altercation: but how much more oppressive as a sentiment committed to writing by the cool, unruffled, discrimi nating impartiality of a Lord High Chancellor, in a letter to a Roman Catholic peer; for the obvious purpose of wounding the Roman Catholic religion, through the de

gradation of a Roman Catholic bishop; and if unrefuted by me, or rather if not explained by your lordship as an unintentional misstatement, it must go down to posterity with irreparable injury to myself; and by association, perhaps to the community I belong to. It becomes, therefore, imperative upon me, my lord, to convince you that you have here most grievously misrepresented me, through the unfounded suggestions of others: after which I cannot but hope that your lordship will be forward to acknowledge the error, and equally disposed to regret it. I now beg leave, however humiliating the asseveration, to declare before that awful tribunal, where your lordship, as well as I, shall one day be arraigned, that were it possible an angel from Heaven could propose. to me, not the mace of your lordship, not the sceptre of my Sovereign, but the uncontroled dominion of this globe, as a reward for assenting to the murder of the meanest wretch that ever moved upon it, I should consider myself bound to say to that angel, with St. Paul," be thou accursed;" nor for so saying should I raise myself in my own estimation above the lowest line on the scale of negative merit. Neither do I claim a higher place for declaring, as I now do in the presence of God, that being a liege subject of his Majesty King George the Third, I hold myself bound by the dictates of my religion, independently of the oaths I have taken, to bear him true allegiance, and to inculcate the same obligation upon all those who are subject to my jurisdiction. Nay, further, I declare myself more firmly bound to him by the dictates of my religion, than by every tie: being as little able in adverse circumstances to answer for my loyalty to the King, without the aid of my religion, as to answer for my fidelity to God, without the aid of his grace. Conformably to this impression, my lord, I have enforced, with particular energy, the duty of allegiance both in my public and private instruction, during the troub es of 1798; strictly enjoining my clergy to with-hold the sacred rites from all persons implicated in the treason of that time, until the oath and the treason it cemented should have been first abjured: by which means, many hundreds, if not many thousands, were detached from that treasonable compact who to this very day might have adhered to it. In answer to the allegation of pointed disrespect to those cler gymen who were represented to your lordship as having saved the lives of loyal men, I can boldly assert in the face of this diocese, that the only priest I knew of, as coming precisely within that description, by

whose life was threatened, is the very man I soon after selected for my vicar-general; and with hom, at this day, in that confiden tial capacity, I continue on terms of sincere regard and affection The other clergyman distinguished for loyal exertions at that trying period, will acknowledge, if called upon, that instead of treating them disrespectfully, I esteem them all and venerate them. That every priest of mine, however, is perfectly satisfied, is what I am not presumptuous enough to affirm: it seldom fails to be the lot of any one in my place, not to have individuals displeased with him; but I can confidently say that I know of only one clergyman in this entire diocese who considers himself aggrieved by my administration; and to that very clergyman I as confidently appeal whether what he complains of in my conduct towards him, has risen from his efforts in behalf of loyal men. If more minute inquiries, suggested by your lordship's pregnant charge, have since discovered to me a priest prostituting the sacred laver of regeneration, in compliance with the pusillanimous request of a loyal Protestant gentleman, who to court the rabble (when like others around him he should have opposed them) entreated this priest in their presence to baptize him; I shall never deem such condescension, whether elicited by good nature or by loyalty, entitled to extraordinary credit; much less can I look upon it as a counterpoise against every subsequent failure or inaptitude.- The Rev. Peter O'Neil, to whom your lordship alludes in this same letter to Lord Fingall, as been urged by the obloquy which assailed him, to lay the particulars of his situation before the public in an humble remonstrance forwarded to your lordship, through the post-office, at my own instance, the moment it issued from the press. It has, I trust, my lord, fully vindicated my conduct towards that much injured man, and removed the painful imputation of insult to the offended justice of the laws. It has, in my apprehension, demonstrated that his return was the concurrent act of two successive chief governors; the one suspending his transportation-the other ordering him home from it. Nor this, my lord, by way of pardon which was never solicited, but by an impartial decision upon the merits of his case. I will accordingly presume to hope, that your lordship, having daly considered the facts stated in his remonstrance, is rather inclined to think that the justice of the laws which had sunk under his condemnation, hath re-asserted its power, and triumphed in his acquittal.

this remonstrance, that Mr. O'Neil's reinstatement in his former place, was not so much an act of mine, as the provision of a spiritual law, which in similar circum. stances would restore a clergyman of the established church.. By thus shewing. how strai gely I was misrepresented to your lordship, I would not be understood to insinuate that the personage who had the honour of addressing you, intended to misre present me; I am fully convinced, my lord, that you would admit no man to your correspondence who could willingly deviate from the truth: but I am alike convinced that this personage, respectable as he doubt less is, must have been in the present in stance most grossly imposed upon.Neither the elevated rank of noblemen, nor their sacred regard to veracity, can always secure them against imposition from a cer tain class of men who artfully contrive to beset them-esquires of very late creation, who with matchless intrepidity of counte nance, can assassinate characters or whisper them away, and swear their own falsehoods into currency. When the truly loyal are every where intent upon uniting all hearts and all bands in the common cause, and for the common good, these men are every where indefatigable in promoting animosity and distrust for their own private purposes. I shall say no more of them than barely to remind your lordship, how much easier it is for such gentry to make their impression, than for an honest man to efface it.It remains for me to observe, before I close this letter, that upon the first intimation. I received from a person of rank in the me tropolis, that 1 have been traduced as above, Instantly wrote a refutation of the charges; and was then assured it should he laid before your lordship. But an unwillingness to intrude, has since, it seems, prevailed against the promise made me; which cir cumstance, together with the publication in the Star and other papers since, as they have compelled me to address your lordship in this direct manner, they will, I hope, at the same time, be gracious y admitted as my apology. I have the honour to be, with inviolabic respect, my Lord, your Lordship's most devpied humble servant,

11. W. COPPINGER.

Note. On the second day after I had written and posted my letter to Lord Redesdale, I obtained a more accurate account of the paragraph concerning me, than the public prints or the princ minuiscation afforded. The paragraph says, that brought him (caning Mr. O'Neil) back

to what in defiance of the law, I call his parish. I would gladly shelter myself, in this case, under the act of Parliament of the 21st and 22d of his present Majesty; entitled "an act for the further relief of his Majesty's subjects professing the Popish religion" which act, as I conceive it, expressly requires that Popish ecclesiastics, to be exempted from former penalties, do insert upon a separate and distinct roll in the Register's Office of each respective diocese, their Christian name and surname, their -age, the orders they have received, and the persons from whom they received them; as also their place of abode; and their parish, if they have a parish; a copy of which roll was to be annually returned by the Regis-ter, to the clerk of the Privy Council, under the penalty of 1ool. But as the authority of Lord Redesdale, gives me now to fear that I have totally misconceived the meaning of this act, I can only supplicate his indulgence for an error, which, if not quite . pardonable, will at least induce a milder qualification than defiance of the law. I am the more earnest in this petition, as his lordship has precluded me from any future recurrence to him; and from any further explanation, than what he has kindly condescended to give in the following answer to my letter:

Ely Place, Dublin, Feb. 1, 1804. SIR, My letters to Lord Fingali (as) far as they are the subject of your complaint) were a confidential statement to a person of high rank and character and supposed influence amongst the Roman Catholics, of representations made to me, the truth of which I did not assert, but communicated them to his lordship as I receiv ed them, that he might make proper inquiries; and if he found the representations to have any foundation, I hoped he might be induced to use his influence, (which, I find, I very much over-rated) to prevent what might produce considerable irritation in the minds of the Protestauts of Ireland. These letters, therefore, ought to have re-mained in the closet of Lord Fingall: a . different use has been made of them for purposes sufficiently obvious; but I am not responsible for a publication which is an abuse of my confidence, and perhaps also of the confidence of Lord Fingall. I have, I think, a right to complain of any publication of those letters; but I have a right most strongly to complain of the great injustice of that partial publication, which has afforded ground for the grossest and ⚫ most malicious misrepresentation. Those ..who determined to abuse my confidence and (as I am informed) that of Lord Fingall,

would have acted a more manly, and so far a less blameable part, if they had given the whole correspondence as it has actually passed, in print, so as to be accessible to every one. Any publication I should have considered as a gross injustice, and must resent it as such. My letters could not have been injurious to you, if they had remained with Lord Fingal. If any injury had arisen to you from the publication, it would not have proceeded from me. But the letters, though published, could not have been injurious to you, had they stood alone, and without comment; for I did not mention your name, nor did I know your name could be, in any manner, connected with the informations which I had received, and communicated to Lord Fingall, until Mr. O'Neil's pamphlet was sent to me, and, as you now tell me, at your instance. If that pamphlet makes an application which I never made, the application springs from Mr. O'Neil and yourself. You call that pamphlet "an humble remonstrance" I consider it as one of many extraordinary publications which have lately appeared; some imputed to high authority; others countenanced by high authority; the tendency of which is to insult the Protestants of Ireland, and their religion, and to irritate the different sects against each other. I have no disposition to attribute these publications to the Roman Catholics in general. On the contrary, I believe there are many, very many, who sincerely deplore their mischievous effect. But the publications demonstrate the temper of those who have composed and patronized them; and with a person who professes to consider Mr. O'Neil's pamphlet as an humble remonstrance," I think I cannot prudently hold any correspondence, especially after the treatment I have experienced with respect to my letters to Lord Fingall. I shail therefore decline giving any further answer to your letter, which would unavoidably lead to a long and unpleasant discussion. I have the honour to be, Sir, your most humble servant, REDESDALE

The Rev. Dr. Coppinger.

TO THE NOBILITY AND GENTRY OF THE COUNTY OF CORK.

The humble remonstrance of the Rev. Peter O'Neil, R. C. Parish Priest of Ballymacoda, (vide note No. 7, of the Correspondence).

-The.

MY LORDS AND GENTLEMEN, present mild administration of his Majesty's government in Ireland, having graciously

* Mr. O'Neil, whose superior I am, is the only Roman Catholic clergyman in Ireland who has returned from Botany Bay,