Part 10

During the entire history of the institution its faculty and students have been loyal to the British government and to the Protestant church. It has refused to receive Roman Catholics into the faculty, and for centuries Roman Catholics were prohibited from enjoying its advantages in education. Therefore it is not strange that it is under the ban of that church, and there has not been a Catholic student upon the rolls for many years. An Irish Roman Catholic gentleman remarked one day to a member of the faculty: "If I had wanted to send my son to Trinity I would have to fight first my priest, second my bishop, and third my wife. Therefore I sent him to Oxford."

There are now five departments in the university,--the regular academic department, and schools of law, medicine, theology, and engineering. There are in attendance to-day twelve hundred and forty-one students.

Although the institution is familiarly known as Trinity College, that is the title of the academic department, and with its affiliated schools it constitutes the University of Dublin. The charter bears date of March 24, 1591, under the title of "The College of the Holy and Undivided Trinity, near Dublin." Previous to 1873 the faculty, the fellows, and those who held scholarships must be members of the Church of Ireland. Since then all restrictions or disabilities have been removed, although the history and traditions of the institution will not permit any self-respecting Roman Catholic to send his son there.

Rank is strictly recognized among the students. Noblemen, sons of noblemen, and baronets are matriculated as such under the titles of nobilis, filius nobilis, and equas; ordinary students are called pensioners. Sizars are students of limited means, who must make oath that their fathers' incomes are less than $500 a year, which exempts them from all fees and gives them their commons or meals free of expense. Pensioners pay $60 a year, fellow commoners $150, and noblemen $300. When a young man enters in either of these classes he selects his tutor and makes application for a room, which is assigned him as vacancies occur, and he is recorded. A deposit of from $40 to $150 is required as security against any injury to the property. The room rent varies from $20 to $100 a year. All students are compelled to attend chapel, both in the morning at half-past eight and in the evening at nine o'clock, and wear surplices, but upon certificates may be allowed to attend one of the Presbyterian churches.

At half-past ten every Saturday morning the junior dean appears at the hall and reads out the names of all students who have violated the rules or neglected their duties during the week, and those who are present may offer excuses, which may or may not be accepted by the dean. If they are not accepted the student is fined a sum of money in lieu of other punishment, and these fines are added to the commons fund, which goes to pay for the meals of the students and is controlled by the "clerk of the buttery books."

Fellow commoners pay seven shillings and sixpence a week for board, pensioners five shillings, and members of the nobility ten shillings. A fine of five shillings a week is imposed upon all students actually resident in college who do not take their meals at the commons.

Ten students holding scholarships, called "waiters," are annually appointed to say grace before and after meat in the commons hall, which must be repeated in Latin in a form prescribed by the statutes of the college. All students are required to be in the college grounds before nine o'clock for roll-call. After roll-call no one is permitted to pass the gates without a written order from the dean. Those who do so are severely fined.

Trinity College is one of the few great institutions of Europe which give full degrees to women on the same terms as to men. There is no distinction in rules or conditions or in any other respect. Women are admitted to all of the several schools--arts, science, engineering, law, and medicine--on an equal footing. There are now about one hundred in attendance. At first the university gave degrees to all women who could pass the regular examinations, and they came here in droves from Oxford, Cambridge, and other institutions where they had been hearing lectures but are not given degrees. All they had to do was to enter the examinations and fulfill the requirements. But two years ago this practice was stopped, and now no degrees are conferred upon young women who do not take the full course at Trinity. The fees are the same as for men--$50. The women students are mostly Irish, although a few English girls, who are not satisfied with the certificates given them at Cambridge and Oxford, come over here from Girton and other institutions and work for the full degrees of B.A., B.S., Ph.D., and even for diplomas in law and medicine. To accommodate them the university has recently purchased a fine old mansion in Palmerston Park, where fifty or sixty girls are now lodged under the care of a matron, subject to rules similar to those which govern the men students in the dormitories on University Green. Twenty-two degrees were granted to women in 1908, and about the same number in 1907, chiefly in the department of arts, which is the same as our academic courses, and most of the recipients are intending to be teachers in women's schools and colleges.

The story of the invasion of Trinity College by women is quite interesting. The charter, which was granted by Queen Elizabeth, recognizes no distinction of sex, race, or religion, and when Professor Sylvester, now in the chair of mathematics in one of our American colleges, was refused a degree at Cambridge because he was a Jew, he came here, passed his examinations, and was given one. This opened the gates, and several young women who had been denied degrees at Oxford and Cambridge came to test their rights. On June 9, 1903, the senate of the university passed a resolution "that it is desirable that the degrees of Trinity College, Dublin, shall be open to women, and that his majesty's government be requested to obtain a king's letter empowering the university to grant degrees to women on such terms and conditions as may seem to the board and council, within their respective provinces, on full consideration, to be most expedient."

On January 16, 1904, "Edward VII., by the Grace of God of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland and of the British Dominions beyond the Seas, King, Defender of the Faith, sends greetings to all to whom these presents shall come, with information that by the advice of our Right Trusty and Right Well Beloved Cousin and Councillor, William Humble, Earl of Dudley, Knight Grand Cross of the Royal Victorian Order; Lord Lieutenant General and Governor-General of that part of our said United Kingdom called Ireland, do by these presents authorize and empower the said Provosts and Senior Fellows and their successors in office, and the said Senate of the University of Dublin, and the Caput of the said Senate and all members thereof and all other persons or bodies whose concurrence is necessary for the granting of degrees, to interpret the charter and the statutes of said college in such a manner that women may obtain degrees in the said University, all previous laws, ordinances, and interpretations notwithstanding."

Under this authority on May 5, 1904, the board adopted rules admitting women to all lectures, examinations, degrees, and prizes except fellowships and scholarships, their fees being the same as those for men, and all the rules applying to them equally, except that in the medical department "women shall practice dissection separately from men and medical lectures shall be given them either separately or in conjunction with men, as the professors may think best."

In June, 1904, the senate also passed "a grace" for giving degrees to women who had attained a certain prescribed status in the universities of Oxford and Cambridge, and had passed all the examinations and fulfilled all the other requirements for the granting of degrees for men at Trinity.

The regulations require that women shall pay the same fees except those for the commons (meals); that "except when entering or leaving college they shall wear caps and gowns upon the college grounds unless accompanied by a chaperon." They are not expected "to remove their caps in the presence of the provost and fellows, and may wear them during lectures and examinations." They are not permitted to visit the rooms of men students in college unless accompanied by a chaperon. They are examined separately; they are not required to attend chapel, and Miss Lucy Gwynn was appointed lady registrar to act generally as adviser to the women students and to report upon their conduct.

Later it was decreed by the provost and senior fellows that scholarships should be established for women upon the same terms as men to the value of $150 a year and exemption from ordinary college dues, and several women have already obtained them.

The library of Trinity College is one of the most interesting places in all Ireland and it has two relics which are incomparable in historic and artistic value. One is the harp of Brian Boru, the greatest king in Irish history. He ruled all Ireland for forty years, in the tenth and eleventh centuries, and it is said that he was the only native that ever was successful in keeping Ireland in peace. This is "The Harp that Once through Tara's Halls," inspiring that beautiful ballad of Tom Moore. Its authenticity has been questioned, and some people assert that it once belonged to Henry VIII. of England, but no loyal Irishman will admit the possibility of such a thing.

The other relic, which cannot be questioned, is a copy of the four gospels, known as "The Book of Kells," because it was made by the monks of a monastery founded in 546 by St. Columkills, or St. Columba,--the name is spelled both ways,--and the antiquarians think that it dates back very nearly to that year. It is often described as "the most beautiful book in the world," and one may easily believe such a claim to be true. About three hundred pages, eight by fifteen inches in size, are covered with the most exquisite pen-work that you can imagine, embossed with gold leaf and illuminated in brilliant water-colors with perfect harmony and marvelous skill. I have seen all of the great collections of missals in the world, but have never found so fine and perfect an example as this. There are many equally fine, but of smaller size, in the museums in London and the continental cities. Pierpont Morgan has several specimens of that sort of work, but the "Book of Kells" is unsurpassed both for its artistic perfection and the size of its pages, which are two, three, and four times larger than the best of the other works of the sort. Each page must have required months to execute; each is different in design and coloring, but is harmonious with the rest, and it is difficult to say which is the most wonderful and the most beautiful.

The book was in the monastery at Kells in 1601 when that institution was raided by the Spaniards, and having valuable covers of gold, was stolen by some ignorant soldier who stripped it and threw the text into a bog where it was found coverless by a peasant a few days later and taken to Archbishop Ussher. He recognized it and kept it in his library until his large and unique collection of books and manuscripts was purchased by Cromwell and presented to Trinity College. There are other remarkable books in the collection, including several chronicles of the early history of Ireland, which are priceless, and one marvels at the artistic skill and labor that they represent. They are also important as illustrating the culture and learning of the people of Ireland at a period when England and the continental countries of Europe were still submerged in the barbarism of the Middle Ages.

The library of Dublin University is one of several government depositories, under the Stationer's Act, and receives a copy of every book printed in the United Kingdom. By this method its shelves have been rapidly filled and the catalogues contain more than a million entries.

There is another, known as the National Library, only a few squares away. It occupies a beautiful building erected at a cost of $750,000 to correspond with the National Museum, which occupies the other side of a quadrangle. It was opened in 1890 and has about three hundred thousand volumes. There is a reading-room seventy-two feet square, with a glass dome, where many people come daily to consult works of reference, and certain persons have the privilege of taking books away.

A bill that had been pending in the British parliament for several years was passed in the summer of 1908 authorizing the establishment of two new universities, one at Belfast, under the auspices of the Presbyterian church, and the other at Dublin, under the control of the Roman Catholics, although both theoretically will be non-sectarian, and no religious tests will be required or allowed at either.

The enactment of this law is a part of the contract agreed upon between the liberal government and the leaders of the Irish party in parliament, which is being carried out in good faith, and will be concluded at the next general election, when it is hoped that the question of home rule in Ireland will be submitted to the people of the United Kingdom.

The Irish Catholics have been demanding a university of their own supported by the state for many years. There has been no institution for higher education at which a self-respecting Catholic could seek an education, because the University of Dublin represents the Church of Ireland, just as Oxford and Cambridge represent the Church of England, and until a few years ago placed a ban upon Catholics and would not permit them to have anything to do or say about the management. It was perfectly natural, therefore, that when the trustees of Trinity took off the ban, the synod of Maynooth should put it back, and Catholic students were forbidden to attend lectures there by what is known as Decree XXXVII. of the synod of Maynooth, declared in 1875 and confirmed by Pope Pius IX.

Religious tests at Oxford and Cambridge were abolished in 1871, at the same time as at Trinity. In 1874 an attempt was made by the famous Monseigneur Capel, who is now living in California, to found a Roman Catholic university in England, but it failed, and since then the young men of that church have attended Cambridge and Oxford, by permission of the hierarchy, but the ban has never been removed from Trinity College, Dublin. And one cannot blame them for not removing it. They cannot forget the past. The Roman Catholics of Ireland were deprived of educational privileges for centuries, and under the penal statutes of Queen Anne were debarred from the learned professions. There are no religious tests in Trinity College to-day, it is true, and students who do not belong to the Church of Ireland are not required to attend chapel. But the atmosphere and the influences and every tendency at Trinity are naturally toward the Church of Ireland, which has a theological school as a department of the university.

Three independent non-sectarian institutions, known as Queen's colleges, were founded by Queen Victoria about forty years ago, at Belfast, Galway, and Cork. These are known as "godless colleges" because they have no chapels, no religious exercises, and no religious instruction. Queen's College at Belfast, however, is distinctively a Presbyterian institution. Nearly all the faculty are prominent and active members of that denomination, and students who are intending to enter the ministry go from Queen's to Magee College, Londonderry, which is under the care of the Presbyterian general assembly. Therefore Queen's College, Belfast, occupies a relation to the Presbyterian denomination quite as intimate as that of Trinity with the Episcopalians.

The same conditions apply to both the Roman Catholic theological seminary at Maynooth and the Presbyterian theological seminary at Magee. The students at both of these institutions will be excused from residing in the new universities, and may continue their studies exactly as at present, going up to Dublin and to Belfast only to receive their degrees. Several of the Roman Catholic colleges and the two "godless colleges" now supported by the state at Cork and Galway are to be made a part of the Roman Catholic university at Dublin, but Section 3 of the bill provides that "no test whatever of religious belief shall be imposed upon any person as a condition of his becoming or continuing to be a professor, lecturer, fellow, scholar, exhibitioner, graduate, or student of, or of his holding any office or emolument, or exercising any privilege in, either of the two new universities or any constituent college. Nor in connection with either of the new universities or any such constituent college shall any preference be given or advantage withheld from any person on account of his religious belief." It will be permitted, however, for religious denominations to erect chapels or other houses of worship in connection with either of the new universities with their own funds for the accommodation of students professing their faith, but no students shall be required to attend religious exercises or religious instruction, and they shall be entirely voluntary. It is well understood, however, and the bill is intended precisely for that purpose, that one of the universities shall be Roman Catholic and that the other shall be Presbyterian, just as the present University of Dublin represents the Protestant Episcopal Church of Ireland.

Education and religion have always gone hand in hand both in ancient and modern Ireland. The history of one is the history of the other. Instruction has always been given either by or under the supervision of priests and monks, and there have been regular teaching orders, like the Christian Brothers, which combine religious with secular instruction, with the catechism as their chief text-book. As early as the middle of the sixth century the monastery schools of Ireland were famous all over the world, and even at that date there were three thousand students at Clonarde College, and an equal number at Bangor, at Monasterboice, and several other centers of learning. The sons of kings, chiefs, nobles, and other favored classes lived in the monasteries with their instructors, but usually each ordinary student had a little hut of sod built by himself, and often those from the same locality or the same clan built houses for their common use.

All of the more important schools had students from foreign lands. An English bishop, writing in the year 705, says that they came in "fleet loads" from Great Britain and the Continent. Many of them were princes of royal houses. Several of the early kings of France and other countries were educated in Ireland, which was for three or four centuries the most learned country in the world. Great numbers of Irishmen were employed as professors and teachers in the schools and colleges of England and the Continent. Charlemagne, Charles the Bold, and other monarchs of the Middle Ages called learned men from Ireland as guests and as tutors in their courts, and the influence of Irish scholars was greater than that of those from any other country. For four or five hundred years after the time of St. Patrick the monasteries of Ireland were the center and source of science, and art and learning of every kind and the literature of the Gaelic reached its highest glory. The Danish invasion destroyed these conditions and threw everything into disorder. The monasteries were sacked, the monks were scattered, the students fled to their homes, and the development of learning and art suddenly was arrested. There was another revival during the reign of Brian Boru, but that was interrupted by the Anglo-Norman invasion, and Irish learning never again reached its previous fame.

During the Reformation all the monasteries throughout Ireland except in a few remote districts were suppressed. More than four hundred were entirely destroyed and their inmates were turned out upon the world by the agents of Henry VIII. Cromwell's governors were even more severe and cruel, and the parliaments of 1692 and 1695 passed penal laws forbidding the Catholic children of the country to be educated, either in schools or in private houses. Education practically came to a standstill, although many Irish Protestants all through the country did a great deal in a quiet way to provide instruction for the children of Catholic friends and neighbors.

The Relief Act of 1782 allowed Roman Catholics to open schools of their own, and the present national system, inaugurated in 1831, afforded means of education for children of all denominations under the supervision of their own priests, although members of different denominations are required to receive religious instruction separately and interference with the religious principles of any child is forbidden. From that time to the present the number of schools has been gradually extended, their efficiency has been improved, and the government appropriations for education have been slowly increased from year to year.

The schools of Ireland are now governed by an act of parliament passed in 1892, and Dr. W.M.J. Starkie, national commissioner of education, explained the system to me as follows:

"We have eight grades of primary schools," he said, "from kindergartens, which receive pupils three years of age, up to the eighth grade, which corresponds very nearly to that of the public schools in America, with pupils fourteen or fifteen years of age. We have a compulsory education law, but it is enforced according to the local conditions of different districts,--a sort of local option which is applied where the people of the counties of the districts desire it. The schools are practically free. By the reorganization of 1892 certain schools were permitted to charge fees, but no more than 1 per cent of them do so, and they are all Protestant. No Catholic school collects tuition.

"The schools of Ireland are controlled by a national board of twenty members, appointed nominally by the lord lieutenant, one-half Protestant and one-half Catholic, and an executive council in charge of administration, also appointed by the lord lieutenant, one of whom, that is myself, is always on duty at the headquarters of the board in Dublin.

"Funds for the support of the schools are voted by parliament every year with the usual budget, which are absolutely controlled by the board, who make an annual report of their disposition. This year we have £1,600,000, which is equivalent to about eight million dollars in your money. The larger amount, which is about £1,250,000, goes to the payment of the salaries of teachers; the next for the construction of new buildings and repairs; the next item is for the maintenance of central model schools, which are object lessons. The rate of expenditure per pupil is about £3, or $15, a year, and has been gradually increasing from time to time with the allowances that have been given us by the government. Ten years ago the allowance for primary education was about £1,250,000 or $6,250,000 in American money, and the _per capita_ was about $12.50.

"There are now about 8,600 primary schools in Ireland, with 16,000 teachers and an average daily attendance of 490,000 out of a school population enrolled of 730,000.

"The following table will show the number and the average daily attendance at the different schools:

No. Schools. Av. Attend.