in
default of appearance; as if it were a private cause between John Doe,
plaintiff, and William Roe, defendant.

With great respect to those-honourable persons, the committee of council
in London, I have not understood them to be our governors, councillors,
or judges. Neither did our case turn at all upon the question, whether
Ireland wanted halfpence or no. For there is no doubt, but we do want
both halfpence, gold, and silver; and we have numberless other wants,
and some that we are not so much as allowed to name; although they are
peculiar to this nation; to which no other is subject, whom God hath
blessed with religion and laws, or any degree of soil and sunshine: But,
for what demerits on our side, I am altogether in the dark.

But, I do not remember, that our want of halfpence was either affirmed,
or denied in any of our addresses or declarations, against those of
Wood: We alleged, the fraudulent obtaining and executing his patent, the
baseness of his metal, the prodigious sum to be coined, which might be
increased by stealth, from foreign importation and his own counterfeits,
as well as those at home; whereby we must infallibly lose all our little
gold and silver, and all our poor remainder of a very limited and
discouraged trade: We urged, that the patent was passed without the
least reference hither; and without mention of any security given by
Wood, to receive his own halfpence upon demand; both which are contrary
to all former proceedings in the like cases. These, and many other
arguments we offered; but still the patent went on, and at this day our
ruin would have been half completed; if God, in His mercy, had not
raised an universal detestation of these halfpence, in the whole
kingdom; with a firm resolution never to receive them; since we are not
under obligations to do so by any law, either human or divine.

But, in the Name of God, and of all justice and piety; when the King's
Majesty was pleased that this patent should pass; is it not to be
understood, that he conceived, believed, and intended it as a gracious
act, for the good and benefit of his subjects, for the advantage of a
great and fruitful kingdom; of the most loyal kingdom upon earth, where
no hand or voice was ever lifted up against him; a kingdom where the
passage is not of three hours from Britain; and a kingdom where Papists
have less power, and less land, than in England? Can it be denied, or
doubted, that His Majesty's ministers unders