"In ancient times as peasants tell
A friar came with book and bell
To chaunt his Mass each Sabbath morn
Beneath Strathmillis trysting thorn"



(An extract from the poem by Joseph Campbell (1905) depicting the use of Friars Bush Gravesite as a Mass Station during the Penal Laws of Ireland.)

The Penal Laws (1691/1793) - a series of laws passed for the sole purpose firstly, of converting as many Irish Catholics as possible - particularly those of the upper or land-owning class to the Protestant religion and secondly, of excluding those who remained Catholic from the right to carry arms, from belonging to all professions except medical, and in conjunction with their Presbyterian colleagues from all political power, possession of landed property and education.

The laws were short, designed 'not to make Catholics good subjects, but to deprive them of the power to become bad ones.