We cannot more briefly or more truly describe the object of "the report" to which we are about to draw the attention of the reader, than by stating that it labours to accomplish, for the middle and the upper classes, what the education commissioners are endeavouring to accomplish for the humbler classes in Ireland. Those who have followed us in the strictures which we have felt it our duty to make upon the project as far as it has been already realised, may readily anticipate what we are about to say respecting that portion of it which is in prospect; and, if we have deemed it necessary to protest against a system by which religion is compromised, and the functions of the established clergy superseded; we cannot deem it less important that we should enter our protest against one based upon similar principle, carried even to more pernicious extent, and by which the functions of our university would be superseded. But, in the first place a word or two respecting the individual by whom, chiefly, the present report has been concocted.

a

Mr. Wyse is the son of a respectable Roman Catholic gentleman of that name, formerly of the county of Waterford, now some time deceased; who had been in early life in active co-operation with the leading individuals who may be said, by their writings and their measures, to have laid the foundation of Catholic emancipation. He considered himself to have been, to a certain degree, a martyr to that cause; and bequeathed to his family a portion of that burning resentment which the oppressed always feel towards their real or fancied oppressors.

His son, the chairman of the present committee, was early sent to the Jesuit establishment at Stoneyhurst, where his education was directed with all the care and all the skill for which the teachers in that seminary are so distinguished. Let those who know what the Jesuits are, say whether, in such an establishment, his hereditary antipathies were more likely to be removed or strengthened? We believe it is very well known that the fathers of that order do not neglect any fair opportunity of promoting the interests of their body, or forwarding the ends of their institution, by indoctrinating such minds as come under their guidance, with the principles most favourable to their peculiar views; and we have every reason to believe that they rejoiced in Mr. Wyse as an apt and promising pupil; one by whom their inveterate hatred of heresy would be cherished, and something done towards the detrusion of an offensive establishment from the place which, in their judgment, could only be rightfully occupied by that ancient and apostolic church, of which they were the most distinguished members.

Mr. Wyse, we believe, left that seminary with a mind as strongly tinctured with their peculiar opinions, as his Jesuit instructors could desire, and became a student in the Dublin university. He was, as a Roman Catholic, exempted from all attendance upon the ordinances of the Protestant church; while he took very good care to cherish and keep alive the peculiar piety which he had imbibed at Stoneyhurst. He had, we remember, a little altar erected in his

9th August, 1838.

VOL. XIII.

I

room, before which he was accustomed to offer his devotions; and should any of his former instructors visit him, they would see, at once, that their lessons were not thrown away; that he was still a devoted son of the church; and the same promising individual in a Protestant university, that he had been so fondly recognised to be when amongst themselves.

All this we do not set down with any view to the disparagement of the honourable gentleman. He was, when in our university, remarkable both for the correctness of his morals, and the closeness of his application. He entered an accomplished classic; and he was unwearied in his efforts for the attainment of scientific knowledge; and successful to a degree that industry is rarely successful, when not happily seconded by nature for Mr. Wyse did not exhibit any marked develop ment of scientific powers. His mind was rather elegant and cultivated, than vigorous or powerful. He was reserved and gentle in his manners, and we have known few who were admitted into his familiar intercourse, who did not entertain for him a mingled sentiment of affection and respect. He bore the impress of what the wellknown college badge-man, " Jerry," used to call, "old respectability ;" and even his popish peculiarities, (for popery was at that time couchant, not rampant, "hushed in grim repose," not brindling with ferocious eagerness,) served to give a quaint sort of interest to his character, and to heighten, by a touch of the antique, and a tinge of the superstitious, the assemblage of rare and of brilliant qualities, for which he was almost equally indebted to the efforts of industry and the bounty of nature. Such was Mr. Wyse, before he launched upon the troubled sea of politics, and became connected with that system of agitation by which he and his associates have been enabled to accomplish what has been boastfully termed a peaceful revolution. At school, the disciples of Loyola regarded him as their most hopeful pupil. In college he did not belie the promises of his youth; and even when others of his early associates lapsed, or were supposed to lapse, into an indifference, or even a scepticism, respecting the dogmas of their creed, his fidelity never was for a moment called in question; and he continued, both in profession and practice, strict among the very strictest of the members of the

Church of Rome. Nor is there exhibited any marked departure from that character, in his career as an agitator, or as a member of parliament. It is not now quite so certain, as it was when he was a younger man, that he has the same undoubting belief in all the doctrines of Romanism, or the same punctilious attachment to its observances. We would not venture ourselves to say that he has been very recently at confession, or one whit more severe upon himself than the squire of La Mancha's celebrated knight, in his penitential flagellations. But what of that if years, and travel, and liberalizing intercourse, have changed his judgment respecting one system, they have operated no change in his affections towards another. It is, to his Jesuit masters, comparatively of little moment that he does not love popery more, provided he does not hate the Church of England less. Aud they can be even well pleased with a semblable scepticism, which only serves to give a greater air of plausibility to schemes by which the object next their hearts may be most effectually promoted.

It is strange, though true, that a papist who passes, through liberalism, into infidelity, only seems to acquire a deeper hatred of Protestant Christianity-a hatred which deepens, and would seem to become inveterate, precisely in proportion as a reformed creed becomes scriptural and enlightened. Whether it be that they are impressed with a belief that the only form of Christianity which could be true, is the popish form; and that as that is false, every other must, a fortiori, be still more false; or, that the evil heart of unbelief engenders in them that malevolence, by the working of which, "what is comely envenoms him that bears it ;" however it may be accounted for, most certain is the fact, that the most thorough-going instruments of popery, and the most unrelenting enemies of the Church of England, are to be found amongst those who, if they were to be judged according to the sentiments of their hearts, must be condemned, by the Church of Rome, as infidels or apostates! They hate it, even as an angel of darkness may be supposed to hate an angel of light; and lend themselves, for its overthrow, to the devices of the old lady whom they have, in spirit, abjured, as though no change whatever had taken place in their attachment to

her. The Jesuits know this well, and never fear to lose the service of a pupil whom they have trained, because he has ceased to be a papist. No. The leaven of hatred continues to ferment, long after the spark of faith has been extinguished; and the Jesuits know they may calculate upon their man, for all purposes of persecution against Frotestants, long after the time when it could be pretended that his belief might be available for his own salvation. They are, therefore, wise in their generation. There is no device which they leave unemployed to commend themselves and their system to the unwary minds of all who can be drawn within the circle of their influence; certain that, in one way or another, an end will be answered worthy of all their pains; and that, if a firm adhesion to their religion be not produced, a principle of unappeasable rancour against an opposite one will be generated, by which results scarcely less desirable may be attained; and the truth, as they profess to believe it, established and rendered triumphant, not only by the zeal of the orthodox, but by the bitter malignity of unbelievers. Such is the hostility against which the Church of England has to Such are the enemies with wage war. whom she has to contend! How desirable then must it not be, that her champions should be clothed, from the armoury of righteousness, on the right hand, and on the left; and that, while they are harmless as doves, they should be wise as serpents!

We have said that the recommendation contained in the present report is identical, in principle and in spirit, with the Irish system of national education; and that, as the one has been successful in thrusting aside the church, so the other aims at superseding the university. It is, in fact, put forth by its authors, as the complement of its predecessor; that what the one does for the humbler classes, the other may do for their superiors; so that, between them, they should embrace the whole people. It it even proposed, that the board, to be created, should be incorporated with that already in existence; and that special care should be taken, that all that may be done by the new commissioners, should be in harmony with whatever has been done by the old. Now those who have read the reports of the lords and commons, upon the system of national education in Ireland,

or

even the review of them, which

appeared in one of our former numbers, need not to be told what that portends. Who are the great patrons of the Irish national schools? The Roman Catholic priests. Of what description are the schoolmasters? In very many instances of the worst description; selected for qualities which recommend them as apt instruments for carrying on the designs of popery; individuals who may be denominated Mr. O'Connell's police; by whom his rent is collected; and every other scheme of agitation aided, by which sedition may prosper, at the expense of the national peace. And it is in harmony with a system like this, that the new board, to be appointed, is recommended to carry on its operations! A recommendation, be it observed, which has received a favourable notice from the ministers of the crown, and which the Romish priesthood, and the Romish agitators, upon whose support government is so dependent, have so much at heart, that we are persuaded another session will not be suffered to elapse without the most strenuous efforts being made to carry it into effect, as another of the small instalments of "Justice to Ireland!"

In the first place it is proposed that a board should be created, with powers which would almost rival the omnipotence of parliament. All the funds at present existing, for the maintenance of all other schools of royal, diocesan, or public foundation, are to be confiscated, for the purpose of realising a sum to be placed at the disposal of the board, and used, together with other sums to be assessed by grand juries or voted by parliament, in the building, the establishment, and the outfit of the schools, over which it is to exercise a vigilant and vigorous superintendence.

This board is not to be limited, like the present board of education, to such sites for their school-houses, as may, for a consideration, be offered to them by land-proprietors; but shall be empowered to purchase, lease, and hold land for public use, like the commissioners under the general enclosure act, or the drainage act, who may take precedence of mortgages and make good imperfect titles; and to select such sites as they may deem most advantageous, with the same freedom with which grand juries act at present in passing new lines of road; so that, in fact no man could call his property his own, from the moment the powers of such a