460
AN GAODHAL-
gods sometimes raised nations to a high pitch
of worldly greatness in order that their downfall
and humiliation should be the more grievous and
insupportable to them; while St. John in the Ap¬
ocalypse predicts that the inhabitants of a certain
kingdom upon whose throne the vial of the male¬
diction of God's wrath shall be poured, shall be
so tortured with poignancy of national remorse
that they shall absolutely gnaw their tongues
with pain. The Almighty frequently uses the
most unlikely means to bring about the greatest
results, and has employed the feeble arm of wo¬
man to be the scourge and instrument of destruc¬
tion to the haughtiest despots. It was thus by
means of the prophetess Deborah that he over
threw the nine hundred chariots armed with
scythes of the tyrant Jabin — that he inspired the
faithful Esther to submit her body to the rigors
of a long fast by which she brought about the han¬
ging on a gallows fifty cubits high of the monster
Haman who meditated the destruction of her kin¬
dred, and that he nerved the arm of the chival¬
rous Betulian widow, Judith, to deprive the drun¬
ken Holofernes of his head. Similar wonders he
again accomplished when he aroused the generous
enthusiasm of a noble heroine to assist in driv¬
ing the infidel Moors out of Spain and employ¬
ed the brillant Joan of Arc to bring about the
coronation of the lawful king and the disconfit¬
ure and overthrow of the British usurpation in
France. In our beloved Erin the virgin daughter
of King Malachy was made the worthy instrument
to chastise the brutish tyrant Turgesius, whose
beastly carcass was consigned to the cold depths
of the waters of Lough Annin, while his truculent
Danish myrmidons were slaughtered by the words
of vengeful patriots, or were precipitately driven
to take refuge in their pratical ships. The famous
philosopher, Plato, assures us that it is possible
for one man to free an oppressed country; but he
assigns to him as necessary virtues or qualification
justice, prudence, temperance and the favor of the
gods; but on the contrary the Greek poet, Hesiod,
asserts that it is possible for one wicked man to
ruin and destroy his country, and thus he gives
expression to his conviction on the subject, —
"When one man's crimes the wrath of Heaven
provoke,
Oft doth a nation feel th' avenging stroke ;
Then dire contagion flies at Jove's command,
And wasteful famine desolates the land."
Some of the Jewish Rabbi in the tract on ethics
compiled by them from the Talmud, Mishna, and
Gemara affirm that the blood of murder will depo¬
pulate a country. The same inference may be
drawn from the Old Testament where it is asserted
that the land will vomit out the murderers, and
this fact is more particularly established in refer¬
ence to the Gabaontes whose massacre had been
avenged by a famine. In like manner in ancient
pagan Ireland when the Attacots or plebeians of
the country had assassinated the ruling chief and
toparks of the Melisian dynast their usurping
chief, Carbery, surnamed the Feline, after having
worn the regal crown for five years was compelled
by a protracted famine to surrender the sceptre in¬
to the hands of the lawful heir of the murdered mon¬
arch. Taking these facts into consideration apart
from theological teaching, it appears not to be ex¬
pedient to do evil that good may come, lest the
malignity of the wicked be avenged upon the in¬
nocent as well as the guilty. Forty years a¬
go the Catholic population of Ireland numbered
about eight million of souls, and now, after al¬
most a steady parliamentary agitation and the sa¬
crifice of many lives in vindication of national
rights, that population has dwindled down to less
than one half; and as like causes will produce
like effects, a similar course of procedure and an
occasional famine, it is fair to conclude that the
whole Celtic population of Ireland will be wholly
extirpated before the expiration of the next forty
years. If the Irish Catholics by any force of circum¬
stances could be induced to immigrate to foreign
lands where they would be compelled to mix with
peoples overwhelmingly more numerous than
themselves, their doom would inevitably be, to
become racially extinct and having lost the bond
of their native vernacular, which De Tocqueville
affirms, is the strongest tie that can bind a nation
together: it would be impossible to again rehabil¬
itate the race. It is to prevent this ruinous and
lamentable consummation that I have resolved to
step forth from the gloom of my wonted seclusion
and obscurity to underake a task, which I sincere¬
ly with had fallen to the lot of abilities more com¬
petent, and a mind more gifted. The society
which I hereby recommend to my Catholic co-re¬
ligionists of Irish birth or origin, is a religious
association possessing the latent germs of a future
military organization, from which are expected to
result the redemption of Ireland, and the suprem¬
acy of the Gadelian race. It shall be denominated
the Order of the Cross; the men and youths
belonging thereto shall be style The Heroes of
the Cross, and the ladies of every age joining it
shall be designated The Heroines of the Cross.
In this Order all the members are capable of be¬
ing self enrolled and no record of membership
will need to be kept until the institution assumes
a more definite form of organization. Every one
who is willing to procure an Agnus Dei and a
Cross, and offer daily five patres to Almighty
God for the freedom of Ireland, the conversion of
England, and the universal triumph of the Catho¬
lic Church, is eligible to become a member there¬
of. The Agnus Dei is to be worn night and day
in the usual way, next the person, — it is intend¬
ed for protection. The cross may be of wood or
any other suitable material: the little bog-oak
crosses of the Knock Apparition are to be prefer¬
red; they are to be enveloped in red, or simply
