other hand, calling £26,000 a restitution, when the yearly income from the confiscated Church property amounted to over £600,000, sounded like bitter mock- ery. Others preferred to take the broader ground of moral obligation, claiming that it was necessary to aid oppressed and impoverished Ireland. Others again, leaving the past to consider only the future, argued from the political point of view. They hoped that this conciliatory measure, and the better education of the priests, would open a new tera to Ireland. None of these views satisfied Gladstone, who, after criticising them all, finally arrived at the negative principle that the support granted to jNIaynooth shoidd only be withdrawn at the last extremity, as it would have the worst conse- quences on the relation existing between England and Ireland. Some even sought to treat it as a mere edu- cational question. Still the majority could not blind themselves to the fact that it really involved the weighty and difficult question of the relation between the English govenmient and the Roman Catholic Church in Ireland. The opponents of the bill had an easier task. They could readily attack it from an abstract re- ligious stand-point. They divided themselves, hoAvever, into two great sections, according to the ground they took. The Churchmen and some of the Dissenters did not oppose the continuation of the former support, but its increase ; the Dissenters, as a body, opposed this, like all other government support towards churches. Both par- ties clamored loudly against the abuses of the Church of Rome, its political as well as religious tendencies, and particularly the Jesuitical spirit inculcated at Maynooth. Yet Parliament perceived that something must be done to allay the hostile feelings in Ireland, and the bill passed the second reading with 323 votes against 176. After another protracted and severe struggle, it received at the third reading 317 votes against 189. The discus- sion of the bill in the House of Lords was a repetition of that in the House of Commons. The most eminent ju- rists decided in favor of the bill. Brougham estabhshed a precedent in bringing forward a previous act in which the principle of dotation was clearly expressed. On the bench of bishops, six voted in favor of the bill ; among them the archbishop of Armagh and the bishops of Norwich and St. David. The bill finally went through with 181 votes against 50, and received the ro3-al sanc- tion on June 30, 1815. AVhile the bill was under dis- cussion in Parliament, the opposition outside was very active. A large meeting was held on April 13 at Cov- ent Garden, in which both Churchmen and Dissenters took part. Other meetings were also held in the prin- cipal cities. The Dissenters were especially active. Chin-chmen and Dissenters asserted as the ground of their opposition : 1, that by increasing the grant to the seminary, the papacy woidd be legally recognised in Ireland ; 2, that the practice of employing government funds for the support of religion is wrong in principle ; 3, that there were special objections to the bill under consideration, namely, the Jesuitical tendencies of May- nooth, the danger of the influence over the masses of a more thoroughly-educated clergy, the evil of binding the clergy to the support of the government, leading them to oppose the progressive social tendencies of the peo]ile ; and, finally, the spirit of aggression inherent to the papacy. Some of the Dissenters, however, found this platform too indefinite; they wanted the bill re- jected wholly on anti-State-Church principles, and on May 2 formed a special committee at Salter's Hall, dis- tinct from the original Central Anti-Maynooth Com- mittee. On May 20 they held a meeting at Crosby Hall, in which 300 ministers and 400 laymen (princi- pally Baptists, Presbyterians, Independents, and Cal- vinistic and Arminian Methodists of the new Connec- tion) took part. They urged the Roman Catholics to decline the assistance of the Government to their Church for their own sake and that of their religion. Sir Culling Eardley, president of the Central Commit- tee, spoke in a quite different tone in a letter to O'Con-
MAYNOOTH
930
MAYOW
nell. He accused the Roman Catholic leader of incon- sistency if he accepted the new grant, and threatened to use every means in his power to gain his end. An Anti-Maynooth Committee was also organized at Dub- lin, and in a meeting held on June 5 an address to the House of Lords was drawn up, which received 3627 sig- natures, and also a petition to the queen. On the whole there were some 10,000 petitions drawn up against the bill, which received about 1,130,000 signatures. The government, however, remained unmoved, and the ex- citement gradually subsided. It was thought that now the Koman Catholic party would rest satistied, and be truly reconciled ; yet at one of the very first synods held by them the roj'al colleges were excommunicated and the national school condemned. The Koman Catholic prelates in Ireland — CuUen, Slatery, and INI'Hale — had already attracted considerable attention by their Ultra- montane views, but at this last outrage the old opposi- tion spirit kindled again into a flame. Spooner pro- voked a visitation of Maynooth College by a bill he proposed May 11, 1852. Yet more moderate advice pre- vailed : it was claimed that the papal aggression in no wise aftected Ireland, but rather England, and that the most Ultramontane among the Irish prelates, CuUen, was educated at Eome, not at Maynooth. Spooner finally withdrew his motion. Yet every year, for some time after, the proposition of stopping the appropriation was renewed ; and was not dropped until quiet had been fully restored in Ireland, and general harmony re-estab- lished.