The more Ireland’s Parliament succumbed to Irish ideas, the more it was flouted by England, and the greater the efforts made to secure in it the predominance of the English interest. England, in spite of itself, was creating an Irish nation. It had destroyed the system of septs which it could divide and play off against one another; by imposing on all a grinding tyranny it had crushed out local distinctions and family feuds, and had evoked a national spirit which could not be corrupted by bribes or disarmed by division. Poynings’ Laws were the first attempt at the new methods of control which led to the Act of Union. They were soon found insufficient. Not only must Irish legislation be curbed by the English Privy Council; the English Parliament must also have the power of initiating and passing laws for Ireland; and this practice grew up against which Molyneux vainly protested in 1694. In 1719 the practice was confirmed by an English statute, which transferred to the British House of Lords the appellate jurisdiction claimed by the Irish peers, and expressly asserted the right of the British Parliament to legislate for Ireland and override Irish laws. Similarly the Irish electorate was more and more rigidly restricted to the English interest; members of both houses were, by an English statute of William and Mary, required to be Protestants, and in 1727, by an English statute of George II., Catholics, who numbered four-fifths of the Irish people, were excluded from the franchise.