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â– ' 'j NATIONAL EDUCATION (IRELAND).
COPY of the Memorial of the Roman Catholic Prelates relative to
National Education in Ireland, and of the Reply thereto of the Chief
Secretary for Ireland, dated 28th November 1859.
TO HIS EXCELLENCY THE EARL OF CARLISLE, LORD LIEUTENANT OF
IRELAND.
The Memorial of the Catholic Archbishops and Bishops of Ireland, shovs^eth—
That under no circumstances can they divest themselves of the responsibility
attached to their sacred office of providing for the sound education of their re¬
spective flocks, and guarding them against the dangers to their faith and morals
with which mixed educational systems are fraught.
Deeply impressed with a conviction of those dangers which must increase in
proportion as education is placed beyond the rightful control of the church, the
Catholic bishops deem it a solemn duty to convey to Her Majesty's Government
the expression of the growing anxiety which naturally fills their minds on finding
their authority so completely disowned in the various schemes for educating the
Irish people, which have been put in operation for several years.
To this systematic refusal to recognise their legitimate authority to direct and
superintend 'the education of their flocks they now chiefly confine themselves,
aware that it is the prolific spring of all the evils with which the faith and morals
of the rising generation of the country are beset — evils which are but too gene¬
rally felt and deplored, and so obvious as not to require a tedious enumeration ;
suffice it to remark, that in the department of mixed education, exercising the
most extensive influence over their flocks, namely, that directed by the National
Board, which reckons about half a million of the Catholic children of Ireland,
their legitimate pastors are entirely ignored ; for example, neither in the nomina¬
tion of the members of that Board, nor in the framing or rescinding of its rules,
nor in the appointment of its inspectors, nor in the selection of the books used in
its schools, nor, above all, in securing to the pupils sufficient guarantees to obtain
an adequate share of pure Catholic teaching, is the authority of the Catholic
bishops, as such, even legally or constitutionally acknowledged.
Could it be supposed that in any other country, where the numerical propor¬
tion of Catholics and Protestants might be reversed, so anomalous a state of
things could be supposed to exist; the Protestants, forming the great mass of the
people, subjected, in the education of their children, to a control in which the
authority of their Bishops was not legally acknowledged, whilst the influence of
the few Catholics was alone legally felt throughout the entire system, its injustice
would not fail to strike even those who are now insensible to a similar injustice
in Ireland. ,
It is not to be supposed that the Catholic Bishops entertain any desire to inter¬
fere in the remotest degree with the proper management of the public funds over
which the civil government should exercise control; on the contrary, they are
ready to acknowledge its right to see that all j^ulalic monies appropriated to
Catholic education should not be excepted from the same rule, but should be
administered under Catholic inspection, and accounted for as every other grant
from the pubhc funds. But whilst they acknowledge the right, nay, the wisdom
of requiring accounts of the manner in which all public monies are expended,
they deprecate the confusion of claims and obligations arising from the erroneous
construction of that right belonging to the State. It has led to a most unwar¬
rantable and annoying interference with the religious and spiritual functions of the
Catholic episcopacy.
That aggressive spirit continually advancing has already excited the grief and
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