Irish News

New Zealand Tablet, Volume LII, Issue 39, 14 October 1925, Page 47

Irish News

QUAINT IRISH CHARITY STARTS ON NEW ERAARCHBISHOP GILMARTIN ON EVIL LITERATURE-TRIBUTE TO THE MEMORY OF IRISH LEADERS.

laud on the road to greatness, which she has now begun to travel so auspiciously, and which nothing can limit except the folly of her own children. Please make apologies for my absence, and may the celebrations be worthy of the glorious dead.' -

Visitors to Dublin have sometimes noted elderly gentlemen wearing frock coats of a rather blue shade and old-fashioned tall hats. They are the occupants of Simpson’s hospital, one of the very quaintest charities of Dublin. Early in the 18th century a Kildare boy who had tramped to Dublin fell exhausted outside a shop in Parnell Street, and was immediately helped inside by the proprietor, whose partner in business he eventually became. The boy, George Simpson, died a rich merchant, and left his wealth to found a home for decayed gentlemenwho to this day receive the solace he intended. The will stipulated that the premises to be used for the home should be the place where in his boyhood he sank from fatigue. Till quite lately the hospital has stood on that destined ground, but recent reconstructions in the city have compelled a change. Simpson’s old gentlemen have moved into the suburbs, and the old building is being pulled down. Feeling that their costume out of date, the inmates have asked the trustees to modernise it, and this is being done. So the romantic Simpson charity, which began in 1792, starts on a new era. « « • . "There are tons of immoral literature dumped weekly on the shores of the land that used to be the island of t 1 e saints and scholars. . . It is only .actioncombined, continued action —that will stem and finally check this corrupting tide of gilded filth.” Thus spoke Archbishop Gilmartin, appealI ing in St. Jarlath’s Cathedral, Tnam, on a I recent Sunday, for combined action to stem [ the evil influence of bad literature in Irej land. A problem is raised which demands 1 solution, continued his Grace, and which, y if not solved as it ought to be, will havedisastrous results for faith and morals. Basil tors of souls, teachers and parents and guar- \ dians, and traders, and the press have an obvious duty, hut whatever action they may have taken has not so far checked the evil. The public authority must look to this matf ter, and even when this authority has done its part, private organised action .will be required to supplement the law. At the last meeting of the Catholic Truth j Society this view was advocated, but so far the Government has not found time to do ' anything practical. If there is a censorship of films, why not a supervision over word pictures, and all kinds of magazines and ; pictures, which are more widespread and equally demoralising ? If poisoned food was being imported would . ' it .not be the duty of the Government to pass 'ydfastic legislation? Is the food of the mind • less important than the food of the body? Is it not the mind that makes the man? Are we. a Christian. nation? Are there not 1 examples visible enough to all to show into

what horrors nations fall which cease to be Christian ? Our present Government has taken a decided Christian stand on the question of divorce. They have the people, of Ireland behind them. They will have them equally behind them if they take a bold, Christian stand on this question of excluding filthy literature. We are called a Free State. Well let us get freedom from imported filth. Let us' have protection against demoralisation. The formation of character is the biggest industry in the country. Then let us have protection against the importation of goods which make for the demoralisation of our young boys and girls. If the abuse of the liquor traffic demands legislation, surely a traffic .in publications which minister to the baser instinct and cravings of animal nature and fill young minds with unwholesome images ought to be sternly suppressed. Domestic forces against the higher and purer life will be always strong enough to provoke battle, but in the name of patriotism and common Christianity, let us have protection against this weekly and daily importation of filthy booklets and magazines, which should find their due resting place at the bottom of the Liffey. I was glad to notice that the new Limerick County Council has sounded a call to arms against the publications I am speaking about. I hope that other county councils will follow suit. But my greatest hope is in the young men of Ireland. We have, I believe, enough of young men left to make a clean Ireland. It is all a big problem, but it cannot be shelved. We must all take a hand in its solution in Ins own line, and I have no doubt that with the co-operation of all classes concerned the filthy tide will be rolled back and streams of clean and stimulating literature will circulate through the length and breadth of the laud. » * » The anniversary tribute to the memory of the late Arthur Griffith and Michael Collins took the form of an address at the Cenotaph in Leinster Park, Dublin, by President Cosgrave, The Most Rev. Dr. Fogarty, Bishop of Killaloe, wrote to the President the following touching tribute to the memory of the dead: "For the first time I find myself this year, to my great regret, precluded by local duties from attending the anniversary celebrations in memory of the two greatest figures, in modern history at any rate, President Arthur Griffith and General Michael Collins. May eternal light shine on them! They were not egotists, but Irishmen from first to last. They lived and died not for their own vanity, but for the welfare of the nation. They were men of towering ability and big hearts who, at the cost to themselves of infinite labor, set Ire-