IRELAND.
The organs of the movement have published the address of the Central Tenant-Right Committee to Lord Clarendon, and his Lordship's answer. The address is characterized by very marked moderation in its general tone,. and by a special tone of compliment in those portions personally allusive to the Lord-Lieutenant : it places the petition for a Parlia- mentary recognition of the Ulster custom as general Irish law, on the historic ground that a disturbance of understoodaights has taken place in recent times.
"We do not come before _your Excellency in the attitude of complainants against any class of our fellow-subjects; but, as a simple matter of histo- neal fact, we regret to inform your Excellency, that from no fault on the part of the tenant people, the feeling of security alluded to now no longer exists. In many instances the tenant-right custom has been violated, while in other cases it has been partially. destroyed by limiting regulations enforced by the lords of the soil ; and, in consequence of an unsuccessful at- tempt made some years ago in a court of law to maintain that custom, it ap-
rs that no legal remedy is open to any parties who may be aggrieved. . . . . We may state as a general fact in the Northern division of Ireland, that all improvements made in and upon the soil have been effected by the unaided efforts of a small tenantry, _applying to the soil the labour of their own bands; and the capital originally produced by their own creative industry.
. . Should the present want of tenant security continue, we apprehend in Ulster the total loss of all our distinctive prosperity, and in its place the all but universal prevalence of pauperism and of social disorganization. The very best classes of our rural population—the men who ought especially to be retained at home—are deserting their coup in tens of thousands ; leaving their own places to be occupied by a miserable, impoverished, degraded order of serfs, the bulk of whom, after a brief period of exhaustion, will be natu- rally thrown for support upon the poor-rates." Lord Clarendon, by his Secretaryf Mr. Gerald Ponsonby, acknowledged with gratification the tone of the address—not assuming "the attitude of complaint against any class of your fellow-subjects" ; and doubted not that temperate discussion, and a careful abstinence on all sides from offence and irritation, will greatly facilitate the adjustment of this im- portant question: but he forebore to enter into any analysis of the causes which have contributed to the prosperity of Ulster, "respecting which a variety of opinions must necessarily be entertained."
We understand that, in several of the most heavily-burdened of the electoral divisions in Ireland, it has been decided to form a voluntary rate, to be managed by a committee composed of the principal owners of property in the district, to be called the Industrial Committee. The ex- ertions of the committee are directed to the best means of reducing the burdens of the poor-rates by affording profitable employment to the poor people. After mature consideration, several of the committees have de- cided that the only source of employment within their reach was the pre- paration of flax for the market. The spinning of the fabric was generally given up, as it was found that the women employed could not earn more than lid. per day. Until very recently the growth of flax has been all but given up in several parts of the county of Cork ; but as from 7/. to Si. per acre has been in many cases offered to the farmer if they would grow the plant, it is intended to sow a much larger breadth of land with flax than formerly. The secretary of one of the industrial committees alluded to, states that if they could find employment for the winter, which would enable them to give even so small a sum as 4d. to a man, 3d. to a woman, and 2d. to a child per day, they would think themselves in a most happy state.—Morning Chronicle.
The Committee of Prelates appointed by the Synod of Thurles to carry into execution the project of establishing a Catholic University in Ire- land, on the model of the Catholic University at Louvain, have resolved that regular monthly collections, on the plan of that for the propagation of the faith, be made throughout the kingdom by local committees, of Which the parochial clergy are to be ex-officio members. They have issued a long address to the Catholics of Ireland, stimulating them to exertion by allusions to the time when their country deserved from the pen of the Venerable Bede, the name of the "Island of Saints" ; when she "stood forth conspicuous among the nations of Europe, not only for the number of her scholars who earned celebrity at home and abroad, but also for her many noble institutions which invited strangers from all parts of the world to our hospitable shores," and having thus attracted them, "supported them without any charge, supplied them with books, and gave them education gratuitously."
The address strenuously puts forward the grave evils to faith and morals of separating religion from secular education. If this system he persevered in, "at no distant day anarchy will be the result" For the proof, behold what occurred on the Continent. In the revolutions which recently agitated the nations, "who were everywhere the apostles of rebellion, the standard- bearers of anarchy ? Were they not students of the colleges and universities, in which, according to the modern fashion, everything is taught but re- ligion ?—in which the place and function of religion are usurped by a philo- sophy that saps the foundation of true faith, corrupts the morals of youth, and sends them forth upon society to become the most active fomenters of every mischief."
" If there are strong reasons for providing a Catholic education for Catholic youth in every country, they acquire peculiar strength from the special cir- cumstances of Ireland. Here the Catholic gentleman, merchant, profes- sional man, or whatever else they may be, has to mix with persons many of whom have strong Anti-Catholic notions, others are called liberal (that is oftentimes latitudinarian, or indifferent) ; others again no definite notions whatever, yet all of them zealous enough to make an impression on Catholic
minds not at all favourable to the purity of Catholic faith Again, a superior Catholic education, giving correct views of our principles and eccle- siastical history, is in a manner required now-a-days as an antidote against the poison diffused through our English literature, abounding as the latter does in every department, in every form of publication, from the element- ary treatise to the ponderous quarto, with misrepresentations of our church, with calumnies often refuted, yet constantly reproduced in a more offensive form—with the imputation of principles which we disavow, and the perver- sion of those which we avow—with the distortion of the facts of history, which are twisted and turned in every way to our disadvantage. Besides the conservative influence, so to call it, of religion, a Catholic university would also impart a higher tone to the Catholic body : it would diffuse Catho- lic notions through the mass of society ; it would create a greater interest in all that concerns the welfare of the Catholic religion ; it would diffuse a taste for Catholic literature, Catholic arts, Catholic institutions of every sort ; it would create a large body of learned men, who would exercise an important influence on society—men competent, on the one hand, to vindi- cate the cause of religion against the insidious attacks of a miscalled but dangerous science, and on the other, to rescue science from the use to which it has been perverted by dissociating it from and even turning it against re- ligion. . . . We are a Catholic people. As such, ought we not to have a great Catholic institution, in which the aspiring youth of the country may enjoy all the advantages of a superior university education, and at the same time be imbued with a thoroughly Catholic spirit ? Many of them being destined to be our future magistrates, lawyers, statesmen, it is of great im- portance, in an age distinguished for juclicial, forensic, and senatorial talent, to provide every facility for the development of Catholic genius; but it is of immeasurably greater importance that our rising youth, the hope of the country, shall be—not bigots, but enlightened Catholica—not Catholics in name, but in truth and in deed, in principle and in action—not men of ex- pediency, ever ready to sacrifice the dearest interests of religion to the ne- cessities of state policy, but men who would not compromise one iota of re- ligion or its interests to gain the whole world—men, in a word, formed on the model of that distinguished nobleman in a neighbouring country whose strong attachment to his faith makes him the glory of the Catholic world, inspires him with the loftiest sentiments, and imparts its greatest brillianey to his truly splendid eloquence. Give us a generation of such men, and the face of things will be renewed in Ireland. Give us a Catholic university, and you will have such men." As to the difficulties in the way of success, the Prelates give these en- couragements— " The venerable ruins of the schools which once studded the land are me- morials of what the faith of Ireland has done for the advancement of useful learning. That faith, thank God, is not extinct. Poor as the people and clergy of Ireland are, see all they have done in our own time for the revival of learning under very discouraging circumstances, and in despite of great difficulties. Besides supporting another church in a style of magnificence, and building churches and chapels for themselves, and erecting hospitals for the poor, they have, within the compass of a few years, founded sixty or seventy convents, with several monasteries, and established upwards of twenty academies or colleges, on a respectable scale, for imparting the bless- ings of a religious and literary education to the Catholic youth of the coun- try. Behold also the large sums which the people of Ireland, poor as they are and scanty as are their resources, contribute annually for the work of the propagation of the faith. With such results before our eyes, we cannot despair of the erection of a Catholic university."
Previous page
