HC Deb 31 May 1878 vol 240 cc1038-51
THE O'CONOR DON,

in rising to call attention to the condition of University Education in Ireland, and to move— That in the opinion of this House, the present condition of University Education in Ireland is most unsatisfactory, and demands the immediate attention of Parliament with the view of extending more generally and equally the benefits of such education, said, he thought that no apology was needed either for the subject to which he desired to direct the attention of the House, or for the mode in which he asked the House to express its opinion. As a rule, he was not an advocate of abstract Resolutions; but he felt that, from various circumstances, it was necessary for him to raise the question in that form. The Resolution characterized the present condition of Irish University education as most unsatisfactory, and probably no hon. Member would maintain that it was satisfactory; for, if it were so, the conduct of previous Parliaments and Governments would have been wholly unjustifiable. During the last 20 years, there had been scarcely a Government in Office that had not practically admitted that the condition of University education in Ireland was unsatisfactory, and required to be dealt with. Within his own Parliamentary memory, he had seen three successive Governments attempt to deal with the question, and admit that it was one that required to be dealt with. If all the attempts and failures in connection with the question were taken into account, they would, he thought, show that if there were difficulties in dealing with it, it at all events required to be taken into consideration. In order to prove that the grievance existed, he need not go further back than the date of the speech of the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Greenwich (Mr. Gladstone) in introducing his Irish University Bill. All who heard that speech were carried away by its magic eloquence, and it was believed that the great master mind which had settled the Irish Church and Land questions was about to settle also the University question. It was never imagined that five years afterwards the question would be in precisely the same position as then. He had no desire to enter at any length into a consideration of the causes which led to the failure of the attempt made by the late Government to settle this question. He believed that in introducing their Bill they were actuated by the best intentions. The blame as to the failure of that measure had been placed on the shoulders of the Irish Roman Catholics. Those who had pursued that course were scarcely justified in the view they had thus expressed. When the Bill was introduced, they all believed that it would not only pass that House, but that it would give satisfaction to Ireland. He might say, that for some considerable time afterwards there was an intention on the part of great numbers who had hitherto advocated the cause of the Roman Catholics in this particular question to give the Bill a fair and candid support. A very great disappointment certainly did seize them when they came to consider the Bill apart from the magic eloquence with which it was introduced. When they were asked to record their votes, they were asked, in the words of his hon. Friend the Member for Oxford, to record them in favour of a measure for extending and strengthening the principle of secular and mixed education, and not in favour of removing an injustice and inequality of which they had complained. The Government later on, on that night, instead of repudiating this statement, practically endorsed it. They therefore found themselves compelled to vote against the Bill, and against a principle which could not give satisfaction to Ireland. Whether they acted wisely or foolishly, the fact still remained that the Roman Catholics of Ireland still laboured under the disadvantage and injustice. If he asked the House to consider what had since been done, what answer could be given? If must be simply "Nothing." It would be idle to imagine that the Bill of his hon. Friend the Member for Hackney (Mr. Fawcett), dealing with the constitution and government of Trinity College, could in any way be said to remove the injustice and grievances, the existence of which was admitted. He hardly thought that his hon. Friend himself would hold such an argument. If the principle involved in the Bill was carried out in practice and at once, it would not in any way meet the grievance of which he now complained. It would simply amount to establishing in Ireland another secular College and University. Nothing had been done in satisfaction of the request made in 1873. After the change in the Administration, mainly in consequence of the defeat of the measure, a feeling of despair seemed to come over the Irish people with regard to the question. The Government, which succeeded to Office mainly in consequence of the failure of their Predecessors to deal with this question, perhaps very wisely, but not very boldly, elected to leave it alone. But grievances of the description which had been proved to exist in 1873 could not rest long without being brought before the public, and the Irish Members came to the conclusion that they ought not to bring this question before the House without being in a position to lay before the House some plan of their own. Several Governments had attempted, but had failed, to deal with the question, and they felt bound to lay before the Government some scheme which would meet the requirements of the case. Accordingly, the hon. and learned Member for Limerick (Mr. Butt) was requested to take the matter up and to lay a scheme before the House. There were few men in Ireland more capable of dealing with this subject than his hon. and learned Friend, who was himself a distinguished member of the University of Dublin, and who thoroughly understood what University education ought to be, and also what the Roman Catholics of Ireland might justly claim. His hon. and learned Friend placed before the House the year before last, in a most convincing speech, a Bill which proved that he had given to its consideration all the force of his great mind. Certain Amendments having been made, the Bill was again introduced last year, when a very interesting debate took place; but the Government objected to the Bill, without giving any indication of their own intentions on the subject, and it was summarily rejected. In these circumstances, what course was open to the Irish Members but the one he now ventured to ask the House to adopt? To introduce such a Bill again, or any other Bill, would be merely trifling with the subject, and the Irish Members were determined that this question should not any longer be trifled with. They were determined that if equality be not established by recognized institutions of which the public could conscientiously avail themselves, it must be established in some other way. If they were not to have concurrent endowment, they must have disendowment, and if they were not to have equality by levelling up, they must have equality by levelling down, and that resolution had already shown itself in the action of the Irish Members this Session. The action which they would feel bound to take might, perhaps, be disagreeable; but they were determined to press upon Englishmen the injustice and inequality from which they suffered. What was the condition of Irishmen in regard to University education? He would refer to the most convincing speech of the right hon. Member for Greenwich, who told them in 1873 that there were 145 Catholic students in Arts in the whole of Ireland—namely, 100 at Trinity College and 45 at the Queen's Universities; and that, although the Catholics numbered three-fourths of the population of the country, they only furnished one-eighth the students in Arts. He was quite ready to admit, in a poor country like Ireland, they might expect that a great many students would be looking to advance themselves in different professions; but the right hon. Member for Greenwich had pointed out that, taking the whole course of University training, the condition of the Irish Roman Catholics with regard to University education was of a most miserable description, there being only 784 students in all classes, compared with about 4,000 in Scotland, although the population of Ireland was nearly double that of Scotland. That was the state of affairs in 1873. But the condition of things had not improved since then, for it appeared from a Return furnished this year, that the total number of Roman Catholic students in Arts on the books of the three Universities were—Belfast, 1; Cork, 23; Galway, 24; making 48 in all; and that the number of degrees conferred upon Roman Catholic students in Arts during the past 10 years was only 72. He quite admitted that in a country like Ireland they ought not to look solely to the course of Arts in forming an estimate of the educational acquirements of the people. He therefore extended his researches to all branches of University training. And what did he find? During the past 10 years only 218 Roman Catholic students had received a degree of any description whatever in the Queen's University—that was to say, an average of about seven each year to each College. He asked the House to consider whether that was a satisfactory state of things in these Colleges, which were established expressly to meet the wants of Roman Catholic students. Coming to the purely mercantile view of the question, he would ask the House to remember that there were hundreds of young men growing up every year and passing the time when they should receive educational assistance. Who could be surprised if, seeing them selves placed at a disadvantage, as compared with Protestants, on account of their religious convictions, these young men were embittered against the institutions of the country? He believed that the refusal of that House to deal with the question in the past arose from an unreasonable fear of ecclesiastical influence. In point of fact, however, they had not succeeded in inducing the Roman Catholic youth of Ireland to go into the only institutions which they had left open to them. The end which they had in view, no doubt, was that the youth of that country should receive a University education in those institutions which hon. Gentlemen thought best, and which were conducted on principles of which they approved; but they had been trying for hundreds of years to induce the youth of Ireland to obtain their education in those places, and the result of all their efforts had been either that young men did not receive education at all in them, or that they procured it elsewhere under the most exclusively ecclesiastical control which could well be imagined. He asked any reasonable and sensible man to consider whether that was a wise course to pursue. How could hon. Gentlemen suppose that by following out such a course they would in any way weaken that ecclesiastical influence of which they appeared to have such dread? Why, the adoption of such a course was of all others that which was most calculated to defeat the ends they had in view, and, instead of leading to that independence of mind which they desired, and which they thought would be interfered with if they recognized the just wishes and claims of those of whom he spoke, would actually force upon Ireland that which they themselves thought would be disastrous to her. For centuries they had tried a system of persecution in Ireland, and endeavoured by force to separate the Irish laity from the Irish clergy. Yet the result was, that at the present day there existed no country in the world where ecclesiastical influence was so strong. It was a great mistake—a mistake which had always been made in regard to Irish education, alike in its University branch and all others—for Parliament to endeavour to protect Irish Catholics from their ecclesiastical superiors against their will, for the consequence of the attempt would be exactly opposite to that which Englishmen desired. Let the House treat the Irish Catholic laity as sensible and reasonable men; let it leave them to deal with the questions which might arise between their clergy and themselves; and in that way a feeling of independence would spring up which could never be created if they were to be treated as children. So long as that House treated them as children, they would find them a discontented, dissatisfied, and rebellious people. That was the result of the course of conduct carried on by successive Governments. The House had been impelled, by the insane fear of ecclesiastical influence, to refuse what they otherwise would grant. If hon. Members could get rid of this, the thing would be settled. He did not for a moment suppose that the Catholic Hierarchy of Ireland desired to establish a dominant or unjust influence over education, and even if they entertained such a desire, he did not believe they would be able to give effect to it. The Bishops were far too rational and sensible to desire such a thing. As a matter of fact, they had not attempted to prevent the spread of knowledge in those educational institutions over which they had absolute influence. For example, he had often heard addresses delivered by the students of the Catholic University on St. Stephen's Green, Dublin; and, if he had any fault to find with those addresses, it was that they went rather too far in the sense of independence. Undoubtedly, the Roman Catholic Hierarchy had a right to a certain amount of influence. In questions of faith and morals they had the right to interfere, and the Catholics of Ireland were determined not to send their children to any educational institution in which that right was not recognized. As an acknowledged grievance and injustice existed, it was the duty of Parliament now, just as much as it ever had been, to deal with it; and hon. Members could release themselves from the responsibility, by pointing out that a course which they deemed unwise was taken by those who formerly represented Ireland in the Imperial Parliament. The hon. Gentleman concluded by moving his Resolution.

Amendment proposed, To leave out from the word "That" to the end of the Question, in order to add the words "in the opinion of this House, the present condition of University Education in Ireland is most unsatisfactory, and demands the immediate attention of Parliament with the view of extending more generally and equally the benefits of such education,"—(The O'Conor Don,) —instead thereof.

Question proposed, "That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the Question."

MR. LOWE

said, that the hon. Member for Roscommon (the O'Conor Don), in his very interesting and moderate speech, had given an account of the causes which had led to the resignation of the late Government. The causes, as far as he (Mr. Lowe) understood them, were simply these. The late Government attempted to found a system of mixed University education, so that Protestants and Catholics should not be educated at different Universities. They failed in persuading the House to adopt that system, and the hon. Gentleman said that he and his Friends had some share in that result. But there was little use in dwelling on that matter now. At all events, he rejoiced and always should rejoice, that the then Government had the courage to grapple with the question. No question was more worthy of its consideration, and if they lost Office on that account, he could not imagine their losing it in a better cause. 'Tis better to have loved and lost Than never to have loved at all. He had himself spoken on the subject last year; but, in order to evince, as far as he could, his hearty good-will in this matter, and his desire to see something done as far as might be in the direction in which the hon. Member wished to go, he would like to say a few words on the question before the House. He thought the case of Ireland was hardly fairly stated, when they spoke only of the difficulties of University education. The hon. Member would hardly deny that the difficulty lay deeper still, that it went lower down. University education was the completion and the finishing of the edifice, and pre-supposed that a great deal had been done before that education began. Now, one of the greatest wants of Ireland was the want of secondary education, the want of good schools throughout the country in which the youth could be trained, so that they might come properly qualified to the University. He believed that the first step, therefore, which should be taken was, not to found any new University, even if they could do it, but to lay the foundation, if it could be managed, of thoroughly good and sound secondary schools before dealing with University education. The difficulty was that those schools did not exist; and, in his opinion, there was this further difficulty, that it was almost impossible for Government directly to found them. It was with this as with other things, people worked just as they were obliged to do so, and in proportion as they were relieved from the necessity of working they neglected to work. The wise way to promote secondary education in Ireland would be, not for Government to put its hand into its pocket to found secondary schools, for the effect of that would be that those schools would rely from their foundation too much on Government support, and would become lazy and inefficient. All educational institutions throve just in proportion as they had strong motives for teaching to the best of their power. Anything they did to interfere with that motive would do great mischief, instead of promoting the end in view. That being so, what were they to do? The Motion of the hon. Gentleman was so carefully guarded and so moderately worded, that he would not have the least difficulty in voting for it, and he could not imagine that many Members of the House would have any difficulty in doing so. But he feared that voting for this Resolution would not promote very much the object in view, unless some practical plan were hit on. Last year, they had a plan that a Catholic University should be founded and endowed out of moneys received from the disestablishment of the Irish Church—he believed it was proposed that £440,000 should be appropriated to that object. He did not wish to enter into any sectarian dispute on the subject; but the hon. Member for Roscommon and his Friends must be perfectly well aware that if the present Government were ever so willing to do anything of the kind, it would be perfectly impossible to carry any such measure through the House. It would be only running their heads against a wall even more disastrously than the late Government had done. It was really not worth while arguing the question; but everyone who knew the state of feeling in England, Scotland, and a part of Ireland, must know that if any Government, constituted as this Government was, were to attempt to carry such a measure, it would be surely running upon its own destruction. Well, then, what could be done? Something, which he took the liberty of urging last year, and he apologized to the House for doing so again—it was that they should recur to what was part of the plan of the Government four years ago, that they should take so much of the plan as involved no sectarian difficulty. The late Government failed, because they tried to unite Catholics and Protestants in one system under a mixed Board. It was of little use to ask any Government either to renew that scheme, or to found out of public funds a purely Catholic University. He would not argue whether it would be good or bad to found such a University in Ireland; all he said was, that it was not in the power of that House to do so. What they should endeavour to do was to make it worth people's while to found these secondary schools, by offering such prizes and endowments as would induce parents to send their children to them. What they could not do directly, they might do indirectly. Having got rid of the difficulty of teaching, they should have an examination for young men, and Government should be willing to supply very liberally funds and rewards for those students who might have shown fair proficiency in their examinations, so that by scholarships they might be enabled to go to whatever University their parents might select for them; and, when they came to be examined for their degree, they should act with equal liberality, and give those young men, who showed that they had acquired a sufficient mastery of the subjects in which they were examined, exhibitions, or something of the kind, lasting for seven or eight years, which would enable such young men to get a fair start in life. This plan would not only be a great advantage to poor and deserving young men, but it would have another advantage almost as great, because, as soon as it was known that there were these prizes to be obtained, there would be a strong desire among the parents to have their sons thoroughly well grounded; and thus, without getting into any trouble about religion, or saying whether education in Ireland was to be mixed or not, but simply by rewarding young men, who had shown themselves to be possessed of a proper amount of knowledge, they would raise up a large class of secondary schools in Ireland. If there was any chance of hon. Gentlemen being able to work out any of their schemes for University education, he would not have troubled the House with these remarks. But, as they were going on from year to year with woeful retrospects, without a hope or a chance of anything being done, he did put it to Irish Gentlemen, whether it was not wiser to grasp what was in their reach, than to go on year after year proposing schemes that could not be granted, and mourning over grievances which it was out of their power to remedy? Surely, such a course would be wiser than to go on urging what could never be granted, and thus embittering those feelings of animosity and hatred between the two countries which had prevailed so long? No man was more anxious than he was to do what was possible for the promotion of Irish education, and no man would rejoice more sincerely to see something really practical effected without either Party obtaining a triumph over the other.

MR. BLENNERHASSETT

No one can have heard the speech in which my hon. Friend the Member for Roscommon (the O'Conor Don) brought this question before the House without feeling that that hon. Member, representing, as he may fairly claim to do, the Roman Catholic opinion of Ireland upon it, approached the subject in a practical and moderate spirit. His object evidently was not to magnify, or to expatiate upon a grievance, but to make a solid and earnest contribution to the discussion of a question of great importance and of no little difficulty. In the same spirit, though approaching the subject from a somewhat different point of view, I am desirous, if the House will permit me, to make a few remarks. The position of the great Catholic population of Ireland in relation to this question has been clearly defined by my hon. Friend who is able to speak with all the authority of a trusted exponent of Catholic opinion. He will have performed no slight service if he has enabled the House to thoroughly grasp and comprehend the attitude of the Irish Catholic mind in relation to this matter. But the religious aspect of the question—important as it is—is only one side of it. Apart from the distinctive feelings and interests of members of the Roman Catholic Church, there are considerations involved in it which are of the utmost magnitude and importance—considerations of national welfare and advancement which appeal every whit as strongly to Protestants as to any Catholic in Ireland; considerations of liberal culture and academic reform which commend the subject to the earnest attention of every friend of education without distinction of creed or party; and considerations of freedom, of conscience, and reasonable liberty, which strike deep down to the very foundation of the principles on which our public policy is founded. With every one of these aspects of the question, the religious difficulty is mixed and intertwined. Still, it is by no means necessary to approach the subject from the point of view of any particular school of religious opinion to grasp those broad and clear principles of equal justice and respect for conscientious conviction, by the light of which alone we shall be able to see our way through the difficulties which encompass it. These difficulties have hitherto proved insuperable. One attempt, especially, to grapple with them, undertaken from the highest motives and with generous intentions, has had a disastrous result to those who staked the fortunes of an Administration on its success. It has been said since then that this is a question which no Government and no Party will venture to touch, and which is destined to remain a monument of our unwillingness or incompetence to legislate on an Irish question of first-rate importance. I cannot think that this conclusion will be adopted by Parliament or sanctioned by public opinion. The greater the difficulty the greater the glory. Many a success is only the last term of what has looked like a series of failures. It would be a reproach to the statesmanship of our time to acquiesce in the continuance of a state of things which is indefensible, mischievous, and unjust, Nor would the solution of the Irish University question be difficult if the only possible conditions of its settlement were recognized and boldly acted upon. The hon. Member for Roscommon has pointed out the effect of the existing state of University Institutions on higher education in Ireland. It is beyond dispute that the great body of Irish Roman Catholics are excluded from the intellectual and material advantages of University training and degrees, by the fact that there is no Institution in their country possessed of academic powers which is in harmony with their conscientious convictions and their sense of religious duty. The 4,141,000 Catholics of Ireland furnish, taking the average of the last few years, about 300 University students as against 1,800, or six times as many furnished by the 1,214,000 Protestants, a disproportion which would be still greater, if we were to confine the comparison to those receiving University education in its higher and stricter sense of training in Arts. I do not want to push this comparison too far. Let us only get at the facts of the case. I readily admit that from various causes it is not to be expected that the Roman Catholic population can supply University students in anything like an equal proportion with the Protestant. Too many of them are necessarily beyond the natural range of such education. All that is requisite for my argument is, that I should be able to show that the number of Roman Catholic students receiving University education is, both absolutely and relatively to the Protestants, so insignificant as to indicate the practical exclusion of their body. To anyone acquainted with the actual facts of Irish life, and having a knowledge of the condition and feelings of the people, it would be a mere waste of time to advance proofs in support of so obvious a conclusion. The right hon. Gentleman the Member for the University of Edinburgh (Mr. Lyon Play-fair) has attempted, by a skilful manipulation of figures, to show that in the University-going classes of Ireland, the Catholics are to the Protestants in the proportion of about one to four. It has been pointed out, however, that in the calculation on which the right hon. Gentleman's conclusion is based, large University-going classes, in which Catholics immensely preponderate, have been omitted; and, also, that suffi- cient weight has not been given to the circumstance that in Ireland an unusually large proportion of candidates for University education are drawn from the ranks of the lower middle class. The actual fact, however, is that, including those who are merely receiving a professional training in law, medicine, or engineering, the Catholic students are to the Protestant, not even as one to four, but only as one to six, while among students in Arts, they are only as one to eight. The deficiency of Catholic students has been attributed to the number of young men devoted to preparation for the priesthood. But what ground have we for assuming that many of these young men would not gladly avail themselves of the advantages of regular University training, provided they were able to do so in an Institution approved of by their spiritual guides?—