Editing Thomas Moore (section)

===''Travels of an Irish Gentleman in Search of a Religion''===
[[File:Thomas Moore c1817.jpg|thumb|Thomas Moore by Martin Archer Shee c 1817, National Gallery of Ireland, Dublin.]]
In a call heeded by Protestants of all denominations, in 1822 the new Church of Ireland Archbishop of Dublin, [[William Magee (archbishop of Dublin)|William Magee]], declared the absolute necessity of winning an Irish majority for the Reformed faith — a "Second Reformation".<ref>{{Cite book |title=The Bible War in Ireland: the "Second Reformation" and the Polarization of Protestant-Catholic Relations, 1800–1840 |last=Whelan |first=Irene |publisher=University of Wisconsin Press |year=2005 |location=Madison WI}}</ref> Carrying "religious tracts expressly written for the edification of the Irish peasantry", the "editor" of Captain Rock's Memoirs is an English missionary in the ensuing "bible war".<ref name=":8" />{{rp|18}} Catholics, who coalesced behind O'Connell in the [[Catholic Association]], believed that proselytising advantage was being sought in hunger and distress (that tenancies and food were being used to secure converts), and that the usual political interests were at play.<ref>{{Cite book |title=Irish Unionism-1920 |last=Good |first=James Winder |publisher=T Fisher Unwin |year=1920 |location=London |pages=106}}</ref><ref>Desmond Bowen: ''The Protestant Crusade in Ireland, 1800–70: A Study of Protestant–Catholic Relations between the Act of Union and Disestablishment'' (1978).</ref>

Moore's narrator in ''[[iarchive:travelsofirishge01mooruoft|Travels of an Irish Gentleman in Search of a Religion]]'' (1833) is again fictional. He is, as Moore had been, a Catholic student at Trinity College. On news of Emancipation (passage of the 1829 Catholic Relief Bill), he exclaims: "Thank God! I may now, if I like, turn Protestant". Oppressed by the charge that Catholics are "a race of obstinate and obsolete religionists […] unfit for freedom", and freed from "the point of honour" that would have prevented him from abandoning his church in the face of continuing sanctions, he sets out to explore the tenets of the "true" religion.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Moore |first1=Thomas |title=Travels of an Irish Gentleman in Search of a Religion (in Two Volumes) |date=1833 |publisher=Longman |location=London |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=9TIJAAAAQAAJ}}</ref><ref name=":8" />{{rp|161-162}}

Predictably, the resolve the young man draws from his theological studies is to remain true to the faith of his forefathers (not to exchange "the golden armour of the old Catholic Saints" for "heretical brass").<ref name="Moore, Political and Historical Writings" />{{rp|178}} The argument, however, was not the truth of Catholic doctrine. It was the inconsistency and fallacy of the bible preachers. Moore's purpose, he was later to write, was to put "upon record" the "disgust" he felt at "the arrogance with which most Protestant parsons assume […] credit for being the only true Christians, and the insolence with which […] they denounce all Catholics as [[Idolatry|idolators]] and [[Antichrist]]".<ref name="Moore, Political and Historical Writings" />{{rp|248}} Had his young man found "among the Orthodox of the first [Christian] ages" one "particle" of their rejection of the supposed "corruptions" of the Roman church – justification not by [[sola fide|faith alone]] but also by [[good works]], [[transubstantiation]], and veneration of saints, relics and images — he would have been persuaded.<ref name="Moore, Political and Historical Writings" />{{rp|178}}

Moore's work elicited an immediate riposte. The ''Second Travels of an Irish Gentleman in Search of Religion'' (1833)<ref>{{Cite book |last=White |first=Joseph Blanco |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=YOGSTJNloE4C&pg=PA1 |title=Second travels of an Irish gentleman in search of a religion / |date=1833 |publisher=R. Milliken |series= |location=Dublin}}</ref> was a vindication of the reformed faith by an author described as "not the editor of ''Captain Rock's Memoirs''" — the Spanish exile and Protestant convert [[Joseph Blanco White]].<ref>{{Cite web |last=Whelan |first=Brian |date=2017 |title=The Faith Journey of Joseph Blanco White |url=https://www.ireland.anglican.org/news/7212/the-faith-journey-of-joseph |access-date=2023-04-11 |website=Church of Ireland}}</ref>

In 1816, Moore had published a ''A Series of Sacred Songs, Duets and Trios'' of which the first, [https://hymnology.hymnsam.co.uk/t/thou-art,-o-god,-the-life-and-light "Thou art, O God"], became a popular hymn.<ref name=":2" /> But despite acknowledging Catholicism as Ireland's "national faith",<ref>Moore, as "Their Devoted Servant", dedicates ''The Travel of an Irish Gentleman'' "to the People of Ireland" as a "Defence their Ancient and National Faith", {{cite book |last1=Moore |first1=Thomas |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=9TIJAAAAQAAJ |title=Travels of an Irish Gentleman in Search of a Religion (in Two Volumes) |date=1833 |publisher=Longman |location=London}}</ref> and the example of a devout mother, Moore appears to have abandoned the formal practice of his religion as soon as he entered Trinity.<ref name="Harry White" />

[[Brendan Clifford]], editor of Moore's political writings, interprets Moore's philosophy as "cheerful paganism", or, at the very least, "''à la carte'' Catholicism" in which Moore favoured "what scriptural Protestantism hated: the music, the theatricality, the symbolism, the idolatry".<ref name=":8" />{{rp|15}}