THE IRISH EDUCATIONAL QUESTION.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XIII, Issue 20, 11 September 1885, Page 9

THE IRISH EDUCATIONAL QUESTION.

(Dublin Freeman, May 11.)

Wk placed before our readers in two editions last week the series of resolutions unanimously adopted by the Prelates of the Episcopal Committee on Education, assembled in council at Maynooth College. They speak in no faltering tones, and they leave no one in doubt as to the high purposes at which they aim. They strike direct at the wrongs which it is proposed to redress and, they assert, calmly but resolutely, the claims which the Catholics of Ireland are determined to enforce. Too often, and for too long a time, these claims have been urged with bated breath, and as <* result have met with but scanty acknowledgment. The time for this has gone and gone for ever, and the Catholics of Ireland, knowing their rights, are resolved to have them. The Queen's Colleges must go, and the money that is lavished by the State on them and on kindred educational institutions must be given in due proportion to institutions where the Catholic y»uth of the country shall not be obliged to " make any sacrifice of their religious principles " in return for the advantages held out to them. The third resolution is one of the highest importance and deserves the careful study of the new Administration—" That the continued exclusion of the Catholics of this country from their due share in the aforesaid endowments is not only a serious obstacle to the progress of education, but is a great and irritating grievance, calculated to keep alive a spirit of discontent and disaffection." The Irish Parliamentary Party will receive with just pride the renewed expression of confidence of the Irish Episcopacy in its zeal, ability, and intrepidity in advocacy of Irish National claims. The Bishops look with undiminisbed hopefulness to that Party in the new Educational struggle which their resolutions of Wednesday inaugurate, and •end their hearty God-speed in the work, which, we feel assured, erery member of the Party will cheerfully help. The war upon the Queen's Colleges is to be vigorous and unceasing, and every foothold of which theyi are at present in possession is to be stoutly contested, until Catholic claims have been acknowledged and provided for. The splendid series of resolutions concludes with the clear and emphatic assertion of a principle and a practice for which we have never ceased to contend on half of our Catholic fellowcountrymen :—": — " That on Commissions and other public bodies appointed for educational purposes we claim, as a matter of justice, that the Catholic body ihould have a representation proportionate to their numbers, and that the Catholic representatives should be persons enjoying the confidence of the Catholic body." There is a ring in these words which will gladden the National heart, and tbey sotuid the death-knell of " Cawtholicism."