d before his eyes. In them, you
have the image of Ireland as she lived before the black shadow of
'47 fell upon her. All went on in the open daylight, under the
eyes of parents and friends.

"The young contended while the old surveyed."

Virtue was safe, tired hearts were cheered, and, whilst these
sports flourished, few Irish boys or girls wanted to know the
road to the emigrant ship.

Would it be possible to re-create the Ireland of Goldsmith's
days?

[Side note: The Winter's Night]

One thing, however, is not outside the range of possibility--to
persuade parents in rural districts to make some effort to
brighten the lives of their children; to have all household work
done two hours before bedtime, to have a bright fire on the
hearth and a bright lamp on the table, and a plentiful supply of
the Catholic Truth Society books, Catholic papers and periodicals
always at hand. Many a poor boy and girl, whose thoughts to-day
are turning to Sydney or New York as an escape from cheerless
drudgery, would then read a new meaning into the word "home." No
matter how toil presses during the day, the prospective two hours
of brightness and pleasure cheers them.

"Give a man a taste for reading and the means of gratifying it,"
says Sir John Herschel,[1] "and you can hardly fail to make him a
happy man, you place him in contact with the best society of
every period of history--the wisest, the wittiest, the tenderest,
the bravest and the purest characters that adorn humanity." A
parent who cannot line his child's pocket with gold has in this
simple plan a means of enriching his head with knowledge, and so
sending him on the world armed. Self-respect would grow; the
gross pleasures of the card-table or the public-house would lose
their charm. Your own words would fall on ears steadily becoming
more intelligent. The parish after five years would wear a new
face.

[1] Eton Address

[Side note: Activity VI The country Schoolhouse]

Could not the young men be gathered once a week during the winter
months, and the school house be converted into a literary,
debating or lecture room?

If the young priest prepared one lecture a month, he might
revolutionize the district by teaching the people how to organize
and foster small industries or technical branches suited to the
localities. There is wealth in the mushrooms on the field, the
blackberries on the hedge, and the cresses by the stream. In
other countries thousands are m