LETTERS TO THE EDITOR.

UNIVERSITY EDUCATION IN IRELAND.

[To THE EDITOR OF THE " SPECTATOR."] SIR,—Yon have always been so fair to Catholics in your views on the question of University education in Ireland, that

I venture to invite your judgment on the following outline of a measure which I think would meet the necessities of the case and satisfy moderate people on either side,—meeting the needs of Catholics on the one hand, and on the other allaying the apprehensions of Protestants :—

(1) Following the precedent of the London University Act of this year, there should be a body of Commissioners with power to draft statutes, some such persons as the following to constitute the Commission :—Right Hon.

Christopher Pales, the Lord Chief Baron ; Most Rev, William Walsh, Archbishop of Dublin ; Right Hon. Christopher Redington, Vice-Chancellor of the Royal University ; Sir Christopher Nixon, M.D ; Most Rev, John Healy, Bishop of Clonfert; Right Hon. The O'Conor Don ; Right Hon. The MacDermott.

The University to be called St. Patrick's University of Ireland.

The Tests Act of 1871, as in force in Oxford and Cambridge, to be applied.

(4) Faculties to be constituted in (a) theology ; (b) arts ; (a) medicine and science; (d) law ; but no part of the monies to be voted by Parliament to be applied to the faculty of theology.

The governing body to consist of the Chancellor, to be nominated by the Crown, and twenty-four other members as follows :—(a) Each of the faculties to elect four, 16; (b) the Catholic Bishops as Founders of the Catholic University to nominate 4; (c) the Crown to nominate 4; total, 24.

In framing statutes the Commissioners to follow, as far as may be. the lines of the Oxford and Cambridge Commis. sions of 1877.

Now it seems to me that such a measure would, at least in principle, constitute a fair compromise. Catholics might

accept it, not as their ideal of a University, but as unobjec- tionable and as good a measure as they can expect from Par- liament. Protestants might acquiesce in it for the sake of

peace, and as a gracious concession to the religious sentiments of a large body of their fellow-citizens, and all parties might

hail it as the termination of a long and unpleasant contro- versy.

If a Commission were appointed in the next Session of Parliament it would have its statutes drawn, and the consti- tution of the new University elaborated, for the sanction of Parliament in the Session of 1900, and we should then have before us the concrete institution with which we had to deal; and it may well be that many persons who now are vehemently opposed to any concession would then realise that they had very little ground for their opposition.—I am, Sir, &c.,

CA.THOLICITS.