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drawn from premises. Its characteristic, therefore, is shallow unbelief adopted on the dictation of teachers, without any application of the minds of the pupils to the reasons why such tenets should be accepted. The causes of this are the defects inherent in the philosophical course itself, or manner of training; the fruit is the clever, rhetorical, but unreasoning style in which its latitudinarian speculations are expressed by the pupils with an assurance proportioned to their ignorance.

Mr. Pattison fully admits the antagonism which subsists between this sort of philosophical training and the views of the "Catholic party," or, as he otherwise calls it, the "Church party," by which he means all those who still cling to any points of supernaturally revealed dogma. But his sympathies are not with this party, and, while he allows that their alarms are well founded, he coolly tells them that, unless they succeed in banishing this philosophy from the curriculum of the university, their day is gone; for that every mind of promise that comes under its influence must assuredly yield to the power of its fascination.

"For my part," he says, "I think the fears of the Catholic party, whether within or without the National establishment, are substantially well founded. It is especially the philosophical subjects which have developed themselves within that school [Litteræ Humaniores] which alarm the Church party. This party must either conquer [by expelling this philosophy from the course of teaching], or be content to see all the minds that come under the influence of that training-that is, all the minds of any promise that pass through Oxford-hopelessly lost to them" (p. 414).

The Rector of Lincoln College here assumes as a certain fact that neither Catholics nor Tractarians can pass through the honour schools in Oxford without being hopelessly lost to the Catholic Church or the Tractarian party respectively. He holds, therefore, that the Oxford graduates either receive no higher education at all, or that they receive an education which must infallibly prove fatal to their faith in all supernaturally revealed truth. Thus he leaves no doubt about his estimate of the real significance of Oxford honours they are the reward for dressing in a ready, unreasoning style the anti-Catholic conclusions of modern free-thinkers.

Surely, if this were properly understood and adequately appreciated, the so-called "liberal education" given at Oxford could be no longer an object of envy to Catholics of the middle and upper classes, and they would, perhaps, be induced to look with a more favourable eye upon the education offered to them, with less worldly circumstance but a thousand times more solidity, in their own colleges. A happy result of this would be that they would be better inclined to avail themselves more fully of the advantages which those colleges present to them.

Another beneficial result would also infallibly follow, namely, the impossibility of any of our Catholic colleges coveting the supposed privilege of affiliation with Oxford for the purpose of taking its degrees and honours, which, as now appears, I did not characterize too severely when I said that it seems impossible for a Catholic to reflect on the statements made in this article of the October number of the DUBLIN REVIEW without being convinced that the Oxford B.A. is of no value whatever as a proof of learning,

while the Oxford honours are little better than a certificate for shallow unbelief. It does indeed seem strange that, at the very time when a Catholic periodical of reputation and influence is advocating the affiliation of our Catholic colleges with the University of Oxford in preference to that of London, and is doing this on the ground that Catholics would thereby be brought into competition with men of a higher intellectual standard and one more analogous to their own, a Protestant Head of one of the Oxford colleges should come forward to inform us that the mere graduate is a man of no education which it is the function of a university to impart, and that if he be not a "foppish exquisite of the drawing-room," he is, in all probability, a" barbarized athlete of the arena," and that the highest outcome of the "Honour men" is the "able editor," trained in the art of writing "leading articles," and of instructing the public on "the results of modern thought' with an assurance equalled only by his ignorance. This, I say, is a coincidence that does appear remarkably strange.

Nothing, however, of this kind can be said of the London degrees and honours. These do afford substantial evidence, not only of proficiency, but of mental power above the ordinary average. There is evidence enough of this in the fact already enlarged upon, that, out of six who start on the London course with an earnest intent to win the distinction of B.A., only one succeeds in reaching the goal, the other five being all thrown in one stage or other of the race. Even the examination for matriculation requires written answers to ten papers of questions on as many subjects; it extends over five days, and occupies twenty-eight hours in actual writing. If young men, on leaving Eton or the other public schools, had to answer these questions upon the London standard, as the condition of reception into Oxford, can any one doubt that the number sent back would be such as to leave the halls of Oxford desolate ?

But if this be the comparative value of the London and Oxford degree as an evidence of intellectual acquirements, it must follow, with the force of demonstration, that a progressive system of education, embracing in its curriculum, in addition to other matter, the university course required at the three examinations for the London degree of B.A., and after this a full academical year given exclusively to Christian moral philosophy, forms a system of higher education for laymen with which the "liberal education" afforded at either Oxford or Cambridge can claim no comparison whatever.

It may perhaps be said that, though the London degree may afford evidence of proficiency in knowledge, it is not, therefore, a proof of a "liberal education," because the primary end of education is not so much to impart information, as to cultivate the mind and the heart, by infusing sound principles of truth, virtue, honour, morality, self-control, and the other qualities which make up the character of a true Christian gentleman.

I must beg to observe that I have not said that the London University has adopted the best curriculum, viewed as a means of intellectual culture. On the contrary, I have said that among the motives which led to its adoption as part of the studies in three of our upper classes, that of improving the previously existing course of studies never entered at all. I may now add that, in several respects, the alteration was considered the reverse of an

improvement. Philosophy, for instance, presents a difficulty which is felt to be almost fatal to any connection between a Catholic college and the London University. That Catholics should have to answer questions on moral philosophy proposed by men whose philosophical views are wholly opposed to the truths of their faith, is undoubtedly a grievous hardship, and seems inconsistent with the religious toleration of which the University makes profession. To a remonstrance made on this point it was answered that the University, being open to the members of all denominations, did not profess any particular philosophical system, and that candidates would pass if they could show a competent knowledge of the received principles and systems of philosophy, whatever might be the particular views which individuals might think proper to hold. This, of course, entails on professors the necessity of exposing the false systems, and consequently that of teaching their refutation. Unsatisfactory as this may be, it would be indefinitely worse if, as at Oxford, the students had not only to be examined but taught also by the advocates of an anti-Catholic scepticism, and if the merit of the answers given by the pupils had to be estimated by their degree of accordance with the philosophical views held by the examiners.

Much less have I spoken of the London University as a school of moral training, for this would be absurd, considering that it is no more than a board of examiners, who never even come into contact at all with the examined. The moral training depends upon the spirit that animates the various houses of education at which the candidates reside. Upon this the London University exercises no influence. Between the members of the university, as such, there is no communion of thought, no bond of union whatever. I speak, then, of its degree solely as affording substantial evidence of proficiency in the subjects which it requires to be learned, on which point, it has been shown, the Oxford degree affords no evidence whatever.

As regards, then, the spirit that characterizes the various places of education as schools of moral training, if any comparison has to be made, it must lie between the spirit of discipline and the religious and moral principles which animate a Catholic college and those which pervade the Protestant universities. What the Oxford spirit is, and what are the moral effects of its training, if we had not known it before, we should have known now from the confession of one of its own heads, the Rector of Lincoln College. Compared with the Protestant universities, those strongholds of unbelief, and worldliness and vice,—a Catholic college is a place of education in the truest and highest sense of the term. There the laymen, equally with the ecclesiastics, are trained in the practice of daily meditation; they attend mass daily, they frequent the sacraments, for the most part, every week; they have fixed hours for religious instruction and the reading of religious books; they have periodically the same spiritual exercises; they are taught to refer all their occupations to a supernatural end, and to expect success from supernatural help; they live under a vigorous and well-observed discipline, which they respect and love.

Horses, dogs, wine, cigars, dangerous books, and such-like causes of worldly distraction, have no entrance among them, nor are they on that account the less contented and cheerful. Dissolute language is unheard in their society;

propriety of conduct towards each other, dictated by charity, is the source of mutual good-fellowship and edification, while their respect and love for their superiors is no less a guarantee for uprightness of conduct than an evidence that their observance of discipline is prompted, not by human fear serving the eye, but by their faith instilling, in simplicity of heart, the fear of God.

The fruits of this discipline are the natural produce of its spirit. The great majority of laymen thus educated retain and cherish through life a singular and characteristic love of the home of their education, and their conduct in society is both an honour to the circle in which they move, and a testimony before the world of the sanctity of the Church, whose spirit they so happily imbibed while it guided the steps of their youth.

Such, then, is the nature and such are the fruits of "the system of higher education" that is offered, under the shelter of a Catholic college, to English lay Catholics.

I remain,
Faithfully yours,

JOHN GILLOW.

The questions raised by Dr. Gillow in this interesting and important letter, do not directly concern the main subject of our January article, which was on "the principles of Catholic higher education"; but rather concern the subject of a future article, which we have expressed our hope of writing, on the best way of carrying out those principles in practice. We will here therefore content ourselves with very few remarks.

1. We heartily agree with our correspondent, that any connection of English Catholic education with Oxford and Cambridge would produce immeasurably worse effects, than are generated by its present relations with London University.

2. As Dr. Gillow has made one particular statement, we suppose there can be no impropriety in our expressing cordial concurrence with it. We refer to his statement that "the new order of studies ", introduced into Catholic colleges with a view of meeting the requirements of London University, was no "improvement on the existing system," but "in many respects the reverse of an improvement"; and that the London philosophical examination in particular is a "grievous hardship." We think indeed that the "Month" has done excellent service, in drawing attention to the grossly tyrannical and intolerant character of this examination, and to the grievous religious injury which it is calculated to inflict on the more thoughtful Catholic students.

Ecclesiastical Documents.

WE

E publish three documents this quarter, which in different ways will much interest our readers. For the first two we are indebted to that most orthodox and valuable monthly, "The Irish Ecclesiastical Record;" which we are heartily glad to see in a new and improved dress. As the first of the two decrees is exclusively for England, we who publish in England are especially bound to notice it.

The letter which comes last is connected with the "Roman documents" on Louvain traditionalism, which we printed in January, 1868. It was addressed by the four Louvain professors to Card. de Andrea, then Prefect of the Congregation of the Index ; and expressed definitely their philosophical position. Reference is made to it in p. 281 of our number for January, 1868. Our readers must, of course, carefully observe, that this exposition has been peremptorily condemned; and that every Catholic must ascribe therefore to the human intellect a greater "native power," than is admitted by the letter we publish. In these days, when philosophical studies are so greatly on the increase, this letter will be found by many an invaluable beacon, as expressing so clearly, temperately, and ably an error, which all Catholics must carefully avoid.

I. RECENT DECREE OF THE HOLY OFFICE ON THE MANNER OF RECEIVING CONVERTS INTO THE CHURCH.

Beatissime Pater

"Inter decreta primæ Synodi Provincialis Westmonasteriensis sub. C. XVI. n. 8., ubi sermo est de abjuratione Protestantium adultorum, et de baptismate sub conditione eis conferendo, additur 'Confessio etiam sacramentalis semper in tali casu est exigenda.' In adnotationibus, quas adjecit Pater Ballerini Editioni Romanæ Theologiæ Moralis P. Gury, dicitur hanc confessionem esse conformiorem Instructioni a Supremâ S. Officii Congregatione super modo reconciliandi hæreticos editæ, ex quâ Instructione deducitur, opportunam esse integram peccatorum confessionem. In textu P. Gury tenetur eam esse suadendam in praxi.

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'Quum vero hic Auctor, tam in Theologiâ quam in casibus Conscientiæ, citaverit opinionem aliorum auctorum docentium propter existentiam dubii de primo baptismate a neo-conversis tempore infantiæ suscepto (adeo ut si nullum id fuerit, vera baptismi susceptio sit ea, quæ occasione abjurationis

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