Irish Books and Irish People

by Stephen Lucius Gwynn

Further, so far as Catholic Ireland is concerned, an immense proportion of the teaching both in primary and secondary schools is done by members of religious orders, and in these, of course, there is no conception of separating moral influences from religious. There is, however, no evidence known to me that even in the few Protestant schools which are partly or wholly under lay control any duties, other than those of ordinary school work, are inculcated except as part of a Christian's religious obligations. This entire state of things is due to the fact that positive Christian belief, and the practice of religious observances, are everywhere in Ireland very general, and among the Catholic population almost universal. It is also hardly necessary to point out that in many respects the standard of Irish morality is so high that the example of Ireland may be quoted with confidence in support of the view which makes moral teaching necessarily a part of religion.

But from such broad generalities there is not much to be gathered, and I proceed to examine in some detail the existing institutions—beginning at the top with higher education.

It follows from what has been said that, in the general opinion of Irishmen, there can be no positive moral influence where there is no religious teaching; and for that reason a university without a school of theology or arrangements for corporate worship is, to Irishmen, a university deficient in moral safeguards. This accounts for the fact that Catholic opinion was much less opposed to the Protestant University of Dublin than to the more modern Queen's Colleges, which, designed by England to provide for her wants of Ireland, excluded religion entirely from their purview. This provision satisfied no one, except to some extent the Presbyterians, who accepted Queen's College, Belfast, with some alacrity, though in practice demanding that its head should always be a staunch professor of their own persuasion. But Catholics as a body refused to accept either the University of Dublin with its Protestant atmosphere or the "godless" Queen's Colleges; and since Ireland is mainly a Catholic country, and the National University has not yet created a tradition, it is clear that not much can be gleaned on the subject of Irish ideas of moral training from Irish universities.

Yet Trinity College is well worth study, for in it we have a free growth, typifying both in its virtues and in its defects the ruling Protestant class, landed and professional. Here, unquestionably, the chief moral influence is that of the Church, felt, as at Oxford, directly through the chapel services and sermons, and indirectly through the presence of a large body of theological students. The second of these influences is specially strong in Dublin, because these students have an organisation of their own in the University Theological Society, and also because the work of the Divinity School at Dublin comprises much that is done in England by the training colleges. I should therefore be inclined to put the positive influence of dogmatic religion higher at Dublin than at Oxford.

On the other hand, the vaguer humanitarian enthusiasms which are more or less allied to Socialism, and with which the High Church party willingly allies itself, have, I think, much less hold in Trinity than at the English universities; though the movement which sends so many brilliant young Englishmen into work (temporary or permanent) in the East End of London has its parallel in the recently organised Social Service Society, which attempts something for the reclamation of Dublin slums. Again, in regard to more definitely political aspirations, Irish Protestants are somewhat unfortunately situated. Trinity as a whole has no sympathy with the ideals that appeal to Ireland as a nation, and it always seems to lack first-hand touch with the best English thought, whether Liberal or Tory. This isolation from the main movement of Irish thought and feeling on the one hand, and on the other, this enforced separation from the current of English life, keep the place a little old-fashioned; and to generate enthusiasm, ideals and feelings need a certain freshness. If it be held (as I should hold) that a university's main moral function is to produce enthusiasts rather than merely decent citizens, in this respect, I think, Trinity fails.

In regard to the less direct influences, a good deal may be noted. The general trend of life in Trinity is towards frugality, just as at Oxford it is towards extravagance. Consequently, money is less of an advantage, poverty less of a drawback than at the English universities; the standard of living is more uniform; and in the society of which the university is typical, and which it influences, respect for wealth as wealth is noticeably rare. Again, the idea of education is more disciplinary than in England. Irishmen go to college, not to acquire culture by contact, but to learn certain definite things; and the university, in its anxiety to find out if the task is being learnt, multiplies examinations. The same idea pervades all Irish education—the old-fashioned demand for a positive result in knowledge; and if it leads to an excessive value set upon these tests, it also goes far to discourage idleness.

In another matter Trinity College is typical of Irish ideas generally. Games are simply taken as games, not as a main business of life in which success may even have a marketable value. Everybody recognizes their physical use, and more than that, their use as a means of bringing men together. But nobody in Ireland, save here and there a stray apostle of English notions, talks of the moral lessons to be acquired by fielding out or by patient batting. Compulsory games at school are practically unknown; nobody plays unless he wants to; so that the duffer does not experience the questionable moral advantage of physical discomfort and frequent humiliation, and the naturally painstaking or excellent athlete gets no more than his fair chance of exercising his gifts. And these are less likely to have an undue importance in their possessor's eyes, because they will not of themselves lead him to a position of great distinction in an Irish university.

Unfortunately, Trinity College is the only place in Ireland—unless perhaps a saving clause should be made for Queen's College, Belfast—which offers what is meant by a university life. The National University, whether in Dublin, Cork or Galway, brings young men together only in classes and in one or two debating societies. Yet even so, I question whether, in some ways, life does not beat stronger in it than in Trinity; whether the moral influences proper to a university, the enthusiasm, the contagion of generous ideas, are not here more strongly felt. The reason for this view must be given.

Trinity has never been the University of Ireland. It is ceasing to be the University of Protestant Ireland, for Protestants, who can afford to do so, send their sons increasingly to Oxford or Cambridge, and Trinity, which has not known how to create a true and special function for itself, is becoming merely a cheap substitute for these English institutions. And the reason for this is a moral reason which goes to the root of many questions connected with Irish education. Should Irish schools and colleges seek to educate citizens for the Empire, or citizens for Ireland? During the last half century, while the Imperialist idea has been developing in England, Trinity has thrown all its moral weight into support of that idea. But the Imperialist idea in England is very different from the same idea as viewed in Canada or New Zealand or Australia; and universities in these countries address themselves particularly to local needs. In the section of Ireland which Trinity represents, local patriotism is held to conflict with Imperial patriotism, and one has to observe that Trinity's Imperialism is forwarding tendencies which are leaving her drained. Nationalists may respect the sincerity of convictions so pressed in defiance of a local interest; but a university, whose main emotional appeal is directed towards evoking primarily an enthusiasm for England, cannot be of much use to Nationalist Ireland. Catholics may (and do) respect the thoroughness of the religious teaching, and the strong grip which Protestantism keeps on the university; but a university which inculcates morals through a Protestant religion is not precisely suitable to Catholics. Yet Catholics and Nationalists alike infinitely prefer a university or a college or a school with strong Protestant beliefs, or strong Imperialist patriotism, to an institution with neither beliefs nor patriotism at all. The colourless and merely scholastic ideals of the Queen's Colleges, and the huge examining machinery known as the Royal University, typified in their total lack of moral influences all that was worst in the educational system under which Ireland labours.

I pass to a brief examination of the boarding schools, institutions which have never flourished in Ireland. Nearly all Protestants and many Catholics, if they can afford it, send their sons to England to be taught. The ideals of the English Public School have reacted so strongly upon Irish Protestant schools that nothing need be said of these—not one of which has ever, within living memory, had a continuous prosperity. The important Catholic schools are managed by the great teaching orders, especially by the Jesuits, and managed at astonishingly low cost. They give everywhere more than value for the fees which they receive. No unendowed institution could compete with them; and it practically comes to this, that the regular clergy subsidise education with their own unpaid labour and even with their own funds, in order to maintain their influence over the faith and morals of their country. Whether it might be more to the advantage of Irish parents to pay more and get something different, is another question; but those of us who least like the exclusive delegation of these important functions to the priesthood, cannot but admire the thoroughness and consistency with which the Catholic priesthood's idea is carried out. It would be hard to overstate the moral effect of that vast organised system of self-sacrifice and self-suppression.