The Sun.
London, England, 1852-05-12 00:00:00

MAYNOOTH GRANT.

Mr. SPOONER then rose to move for a Select
Committee to inquire into the system of education
carried on at the College of Maynooth. He
was confident that in bringing forward his present
motion be would receive the liberal and kind indulgence
of the House.—(Hear, hear.) At the outset he would
say he was anxious to abstain from hurting the feelings
or wounding the consciences of members of the Roman
Catholic faith. He had no quarrel with individuals, but
in the fullness of the Protestant faith, he would give to
every individual the right of private judgment. He
quarrelled with the system of education at Maynooth.
He charged it with being injurious to society—
of having a tendency to create immorality, and
of being subversive of the true principles of alle-
giance.—(Load cries of "Hear, hear.") He maintained
that the original grant was based on a bad principle,
and that the forebodings of those who opposed
it had been completely realized. The system was
antagonistic to the word of God, and was in fact a
national sin. As such, therefore, it was his earnest
wish to have the grant removed. He would refrain from
all political argument, and confine himself simply
to the policy ot the measure. Ho meant to conclude
by asking for an inquiry into the system of
education pursued at the College of Maynooth.
That would probably be met by a common but, he
thought, unfounded assertion, that nothing could be
gained by the inquiry, as the House already knew every-
thing connected with the system of education. He
would now lay before the House the authority of Sir
Robert Peel to show that such an inquiry was at all
times incumbent on the House. He believed that gene-
rally the contents and nature of the books used in the
College were unknown. When Sir R. Peel settled the
grant by Act of Parliament, he said he did not agree in
opinion that the system of instruction ought to be a matter
of indifference to the House. But it was said they could
not revoke a grant which had been solemnly made. On
that he joined issue. Was he to be told that the House
could not recall its own gift if it saw sufficient reasons
for doing so? Lord J. Russell also stated, in April,
1845, though he did not agree that they should sud-
denly stop advancing further sums, he considered that
if the persons who benefited by them became the leaders
of rebellion, or sought to injure the community, there
would be a valid reason for withdrawing all
assistance from the college. That was a sound con-
stitutional principle, and was applicable to the present
question. No one could deny that the priests educated
at Maynooth had from time to time, and especially
recently, offered resistance to the power of the
Crown and the constitution as by law established.
They said, in fact, that they would never be content
while the incubus of the Established Church continued
to exist.—(Loud cheers from the Irish Members.)
Hon. Members opposite admitted that, but by
the oath of allegiance which every Roman
Catholic took in that House, they were bound not
to injure the Established Church.—(Cheers.) These
priests were not teachers of religion, but the loaders and
conductors of rebellion, and ho held that they wore at
liberty to repeal the grant whenever they
found that it was employed for purposes injurious
to the public weal, and dangerous to the welfare of the
fklonareby. The great concession had not been re-
ceived by the Roman Catholics in the liberal.and confid-
ing spirit in which it was made. The Propaganda expressed
the deepest feeling of delight at the exceeding munifi-
cence of the Government of England, bat unfortunately
the practice pursued at Maynooth did not coincide with
what might have been expected under the circumstances.
The books used in the college said that every person
baptized in the Roman Catholic Church should be con-
sidered to be under the dominion of that Church.
They also contained the doctrine that the Church had
the power to dispense with all oaths and vows when cir-
cumstances might render it necessary or expedient.
They then proceeded to point out 24 ways in which
oaths might be got rid of.—(Hear, and laughter.)
Ho would not go through the entire 24, but would g:,3
a few of them. Bailie, upon moral theology, in vol. 7,
chap. 2, page 343, says:—" A promissory oath obliges,
under the penalty of mortal sin, to do that which is pro.
mised in the oath, unless a legitimate cause excuses."
At page 345 there is a chapter with this title—" Of the
causes which prevent or take away the obligation of an
oath." Of these, seven are named; the third is—" The
hindering of a greater good which is opposed to that
promised in the oath" (which is susceptible of a wide
ecclesiastical range). The seventh cause preventing is
the " limitation, either expressed, or even tacitly and
silently understood, of the intention of the swearer.
For, in every oath certain general conditions are, from
justice and use, included; one of them is, unless you
accept, unless you remit,' another (condition) is, ' saving
the right of another. " If a religion were taught which
bound men to look upon an oath in the manner there
referred to, what security could they have for the obser-
vance of an oath by those who were taught it?—(Hear,
hear.) He therefore asked the House whether they
would refuse to inquire into this system? The voice of
the whole kingdom was, that such things must not,
and should not be; and that was a voice which
ere long would be heard in a way which the
House of Commons could no longer resist.—(Hear, hear.)
It was for those reasons that he asked the House to in-
quire into, and put a stop to this system in time, before
they were compelled to do so by " the pressure from
without," which it was always dangerous to provoke, for
once provoked, it could never be stayed. He came now to
another point, and it was one of some importance. The
House would recollect when Cardinal Wiseman re-
turned to this country
he openly professed that his ob-
ject was to establish the canon law. Now what said the
Lord Bacon of the Roman Catholics—their great ex-
pounder of the canon law ? " In every promissory note,
says Reiffenstual, writing on the subject of oaths, in his
"Jus Canonicum Universam," which is a standard book
at Maynooth—" though made absolutely, there are un-
doubtedly, certain tacit conditions, as first, If lam
able'—and secondly, saving the law and authority of
my superior.' " That was the canon law which Cardi-
nal Wiseman was endeavouring to establish in this
country, and which was taught in the College of May-
nooth. Once let Cardinal Wiseman get the Roman
Catholics of England to believe that that canon law was
binding upon them, and he (Mr. Spooner) would ask
what security the people of this country had for the
preservation of their property, their happiness, and
some of their best interests. The Honourable Member
proceeded to read a series of extracts from various
Roman Catholic commentators on the canon law, and
from Roman Catholic books, with the view of showing,
among other things, that if a person in communion with
the Roman Catholic Church had sworn anything which
the Pope conceived to be contrary to his dignity, such
an oath was not binding on his conscience, and generally
the light in which heretics were regarded by that church.
He contended that, in the treatment of heretics, one
principle alone pervaded the whole teaching of the Ro-
man Catholic Church, and that was that they were to be
tolerated until the time arrived when they could be al-
together put down, and that if at any particular period it
was thought an attempt to accomplish that end would
not be successful, the Church was to bide its time, until
circumstances became changed by its becoming more do-
minant. or otherwise. He cautioned the House against
giving little by little its sanction to the teaching ot dea-
-1 trines of that kind, and to beware of the cost. There
was an old trite saying, " The eggs first, and the eagles
afterwards." [The Honourable Member continued,
amid signs of impatience, and occasional interruption,
directly from the Irish Members on the Opposition
side of the House, to cite passages from the canon
law and the writings of Thomas Aquinas and other
commentators to prove that laymen hindering the exe-
cution of mandates, citations, and other like proceed-
ings issuing from the Church of Ramo, " were smitten
with excommunication ;" when thefts wore mortal and
when venial sins ; that the people were bound to obey
the ecclesiastical, notwithstanding it was averse to mo-
narchical law ; that a person who owed anything to a
heretic arising out of any exchange, pledge, or deposit,
loan, or any other contract, was ipso facto free from the
obligation, and was not bound to keep his promise or
perform his contract, even though ho had sworn to do
it ; and that a secular judge had no jurisdiction over
the clergy in criminal cases, "seeing that they enjoyed
the privilege of God and were exempt from the civil
jurisdiction.") He appealed to the House if those were
doctrines which the Government of this country ought
to pay for teaching ? The House, however, had made
the people pay for
the teaching f them. It was, in
fact, a part of our national system, and, he sub-
mitted it was one of which the sooner we got rid the
better. The truth was, that priestly dominion was the
great characteristic of the Roman Catholic Church, and
its whole tendency was to " confine the intellect and en-
slave the soul."—(Hear.) Ho would not pollute the
ears of his audience—he would not be th© teacher, or
rather the publisher, if he might use the expression—of
those filthy doctrines which ho could not have believed
any church would have permitted to be taught to its
communicants, had he not felt himself obliged to go
through the books in which they were found. He would
only make one remark, on the authority of a Roman Ca-
tholic writer on Confession, to the effect that certain
penitents were questioned at confession only as to thosei
usual among that
sins which were most common and
clues of persons; they were to be
iasted if they had
committed theft, and how often—
ded to Day that
and f hey had sworn,
and how often. The same writer procee