The Belfast Politics, enlarged; being a compendium of the political history of Ireland for the last forty years

Front matter

Belfast Politics, or a Collection of the Debates, Resolutions, and other Proceedings of that Town, in the Years 1/92-93 Exceedingly scarce, having been burnt in Smithfield, by order of the Government, it was not safe even to possess a copy. — THE BELFAST POLITICS, enlarged; BEING A COMPENDIUM OF THE POLITICAL HISTORY OF IRELAND, FOR THE LAST FORTY YEARS. COMPILED BY JOHN LAWLESS, ESQ »v— ' BELFAST : PRINTED BYD. LYONS. 1818. ADDRESS TO THI CITIZENS OF BELFAST. W HEN I first determined to collect those political productions, by whose spirit and eloquence Belfast has been so peculiarly distinguished for the last forty years, I did imagine that it would have been sufficient to give to my readers a faithful and well arranged compilation, without any observation, or any reflection, on the practice or the principles of those who have endeavoured to make the past labors of the most enlightened and valued of our countrymen tributary to their favorite object of raising the monopoly of a few, on the ruins and the degradation of the many.

It is with great pain, indeed, I have witnessed the labori ous struggle that has been lately made to perpetuate these jealousies, religious and political, that have already succeeded in extinguishing the name and honor of our country. It is witfc sorrow I peruse the overlaid pages of those authors, who think. no toil too great, no industry too excessive, if they shall be Jt able to save from the corruption of the grave those melancholy memorials of ancient bigotry and ancient misfortune — notes piled on notes, drawn frofn the cobiyeb lumber of polemical ■Controversy, or extracts from authors, who were paid to de fame and calumniate the religion of a people, whom they after wards plundered and oppressed. From Geraldus Cambrensi* to Sir Richard Musgrave, * every historian who has been most distinguished by his hostility to the peace and harmony of Irishmen, has been industriously consulted, and those opinions selected, that are best calculated to keep alive the devastating fire, which has almost burned up whatever remains of humanity in the Irish bosom — the sacred spirit of tolerationevery where scoffed at and trampled upon — the priest, of every sect of Christianity, Protestant, Presbyterian, and 'Catholic, represented as contending for their respective supremacy, with the dagger in one hand and the Bible in the other — preaching Peace with the sword of the conqueror, or propagating the Gospel of Christ with the fire" of intolerance.

Such is the picture, carefully and anxiously preserved by men whose talents and understanding should have disdained so unworthy an office ; whose common sense, at least, should "have told them, that the public mind of the present day, turns aside with loathing and disgust fiora suoh wretched recitals, and that it closes the volume that would revive the aaimosities of ancient days with indignation against those who would thus speculate on its credulity. It must be matter of surprise and regret to every good and benevolent mind, to see men of talents and acquirements sitting down, in the soli tude of their study, to the work of giving perpetuity to the bigot and the usurper, surrounded perhaps as that study is by a crowd of evidence which could bear testimony to the follies and the crimes of civil and religious intolerance.