NEW ZEALAND TABLETS CHRISTCHURCH CORRESPONDENT AND THE CANTERBURY CATHOLIC LITERARY SOCIETY.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XVI, Issue 16, 10 August 1888, Page 7

NEW ZEALAND TABLETS CHRISTCHURCH CORRESPONDENT AND THE CANTERBURY CATHOLIC LITERARY SOCIETY.

TO THE EDITOR N.Z. TABLET. Sib, — The last issue of your Taluable paper contains a reference, by your Christchurch correspondent, to the reported feeling of the local Literary Socisty anent the question of Ireland's autonomy. Ton will confer a gieat favour by allowing* few remarks thereon. Your correspondent i 8 made to state : " Mr. Lonargan has offered prizes for the first, second, and third best papers on the Home Rule question." Now, as a fact, Mr. Lonargan na.B more than once takto occasion to deny that the prizes were offered by him. Indeed, one of the prizes was offered by a member at an ordinary meeting. Afain, the writer of Chriitchurch news states : '• The subject of Home Rule is not a popular one for discussion with members of the .

Literary Society." This latter statement is likely to lead to «oa» concluding that the question has not, as yet, been debated by members. The ills of Ireland have been discussed by the Canterbury Catholic Literary Society long before Ifr. Lonargan began " to stimulate the young men of the Society to study the national question." This matter was discussed, then, at a time when the Society bad a slight claim to the term " Literary," yet they did not have " the literature of every country on the globe at their fingers' ends." There were amongst it* members two medical gentlemen, an editor, three legal gentlemen, and a number of others who were certainly not dunces. Last, bat not least, they had Mr. Maskell at their bead. Prior to the discussion named above, the Bociety was in a flourishing condition both as regards the talent it possessed and its future pros** pacts, or, to quote Father Ginaty, " The talent of the parish was to ba found in the Literary Society." However, the Home Rule debate came round ; ordinary debates of the Bociety are invariably finished between 8 and 10 p.m. The Home Rule debate took an hour extra, angry feeling was the characteristic of the debate. One gentleman who had risen to speak left the meeting in an abrupt manner when called to order. Happy, indeed, for the Society would it have been if the matter ended with tbe division, At the next meeting a member resigned owing to tbe tarn the debate had taken the previous evening. The one time prominent members became conspicuous by their absence, until the Society became so enfeebled that it was a task of the utmost difficulty to keep it from tottering to final destruction. Neither will the contest to-morrow night be the first time Homo Rule ideas have been ventilated daring Mr. Loaargan's presidency. In season and oat of season the right of Ireland to her independence has received the attention of the socioty. A few short months ago the Society had a debate on the subject— result of the division being unanimously in favour of Ireland managing her own affairs. The reported debate on the subject occupied a oelumn of your valuable paper. " The Canterbury Catholic Literary Society is not altogether composed of Max Mailers and Edwin Arnolds." In this your correspondent is painfully correct, but let it be added, that at tbe present time there are scarcely six members who were born in th« Emerald Isle. The members of this Society consequently, do not "imagine that Home Rnle is a question beneath their dignity." Neither is there any need to learn from the " debating club of Canterbury College " which is composed of nearly all Englishmen " and B A's," since this Society of ours debated long before the Dialectical Society, and have considered the subject frequently since.— l am etc., Tics Pbksident of the 0. 0. L. S. Christchurob, August 6, 1883.