“In seconding the motion of my hon. friend, the member for Kilkenny, for the adoption of this petition, it is not my intention to follow into any of the polemical questions which, in the course of his protracted speech, he has raised in this Association.  I am obliged, however, to say in candour that in some of the views he has put forward I cannot agree....  We have given a general concurrence in this Hall to the recommendation that has emanated from the Catholic Hierarchy....  I am not disposed to assist the Government in making those seminaries, which ought to be seats of learning, filthy sties of corruption.  It is because I believe that such would become their character if this tenth clause were to remain a legislative enactment that I shall oppose it to the utmost.”

The Reverend John Kenyon, then little known, rose to protest against the course pursued by Mr. J. O’Connell, which he characterised as not only uncatholic but unchristian.  Mr. J. O’Connell, in the blandest tones, deprecated any discussion tending to division, which induced Mr. Kenyon to sit down.  Having spread with dexterous industry the most baleful elements of discord, he begged they should not be disturbed.

I will be pardoned for transcribing here a few observations of my own on that occasion.

“I am exceedingly anxious, having the misfortune to differ most widely from my honourable friend the member for Kilkenny, on the subject of academical education, to express my cordial concurrence with him in reference to the subject of this petition.  I shall not say one word about our difference of opinion.  I shall enter into no disturbing or dividing discussion, and the more so because any difference we may express could not fail to impair the efficiency of our action where we are thoroughly agreed.  I condemn this clause as strongly as the hon. member can.  Nay, I will go a step further, and say that if there be no provision made by the bill for religious instruction and moral culture, Protestant and Catholic ought to unite in struggling for its rejection.  No matter how splendid may be the accommodations provided by these academies—­no matter how richly they may be endowed—­if there be no provision made for the religious education of the pupils, I trust they will remain silent, unattended Halls.”

Numerous other proofs to the same facts are accessible, but these are abundantly conclusive.  The history of the struggle itself, the slow and evidently reluctant change in Mr. O’Connell’s opinions, and the intolerant spirit with which the enemies of the bill pursued the name and character of those who, although they approved of the mixed system, were as inveterately inimical to the dangerous provisions of the bill as they were themselves, sufficiently attest that faction swayed the troubled movement of clerical and popular passion alike.  The vulgar and virulent anathemas of some tongues and pens not only swept unsparingly over the unhappy crowd, but aimed at the lofty sphere of Episcopal authority, even where most identical with purity and piety.  A malignant charity extended to the errors of the Primate that palliation which perverted reason otherwise refused to admit.  Too lofty to be accused of treachery, he was not too sacred to be pronounced mad.