At last, the conversation simmered down into an academic debate, whether the centripetal system, which concentrates all Irish students in Maynooth, or the centrifugal, which sends them scampering over the Continent to the ancient universities, was the better. This was a calm, judicious tournament, except now and again, when I had to touch the gong, and say:—
"Gentlemen, only three at a time, if you please."
It was a curious thing to notice that those who had studied in Maynooth were very much in favor of a Continental education; and those who had been in foreign universities were rather inclined to give the verdict for Maynooth.
"You see," said one, "it is an education in itself to go abroad. It means expansion, and expansion is education. Then you have the immense advantage of being able to learn and master the foreign languages and literature, and nowadays a man that can't speak French at least is a very helpless creature."
"You take it for granted," replied another, "that residence abroad insures a knowledge of French. I spent six years in the seminary at N——, and except cela va sans dire, tant pis, and a few other colloquialisms, which you will find on the last page of an English dictionary, I might as well have been in Timbuctoo."
"Well," said my curate,—and though he is not very popular, somehow or other his words appear to carry great weight,—"I must confess that the regret of my life is that I had not an opportunity of studying in Rome, just as the hope of my life is that I shall see Rome before I die. I consider that the greatest Irish college in the world, in numbers and in the influence that arises from intellectual superiority, should be somewhere within the shadows of the Seven Hills."
"Why not transfer the Dunboyne, with all its endowments and emoluments, to Rome?" asked a young, eager fellow, who says he can read the Office, going ten miles an hour on the bicycle.
"'T wouldn't ever do," said a Roman student; "you must be brought up in Rome to understand its spirit. Transplanted shoots never thrive there."
"Psha!" said an old Maynooth man, who had been listening impatiently to these suggestions; "we forgot more theology in Maynooth than you ever learned."
"I don't want to disparage your knowledge of theology, Father," said my curate, sweetly, "but you know there are other elements in priestly education besides the mere propositions, and the solvuntur objecta of theology. And it is in Rome these subtle and almost intangible accomplishments are acquired."