strong supplementary argument for the creation of another University or
University College on a more popular basis, to which the Roman Catholic
people of Ireland would have recourse. From the fact that Maynooth by
its constitution could never have developed into a great national
University,[25] and that Trinity College has never, as a matter of fact,
done so, and has thus, in my opinion, missed a unique opportunity, it
has come about that Ireland has been without any great centre of thought
whose influence would have tended to leaven the mass of mental
inactivity or random-thinking so prevalent in Ireland, and would have
created a body of educated public opinion sufficiently informed and
potent to secure the study and discussion on their merits of questions
of vital interest to the country. The demoralising atmosphere of
partisanship which hangs over Ireland would, I am convinced, gradually
give way before an organised system of education with a thoroughly
democratic University at its head, which would diffuse amongst the
people at large a sense of the value of a balanced judgment on, and a
true appreciation of, the real forces with which Ireland has to deal in
building up her fortunes.

To discuss the merits of the different solutions which have been
proposed for the vexed problem of higher education in Ireland would be
beyond the scope of this book. The question will have to be faced, and
all I need do here is to state the conditions which the solution will
have to fulfil if it is to deal with the aspects of the Irish Question
with which the new movement is practically concerned. What is most
needed is a University that will reach down to the rural population,
much in the same way as the Scottish Universities do, and a lower scale
of fees will be required than Trinity College, with its diminished
revenues, could establish. Already I can see that the work of the new
Department, acting in conjunction with local bodies, urban and rural,
throughout the country, will provide a considerable number of
scholarships, bursaries, and exhibitions for young men who are being
prepared to take part in the very real, but rather hazily understood,
industrial revival which is imminent. Leaving sectarian controversies
out of the question, the type of institution which is required in order
to provide adequately for the classes now left outside the influence of
higher education is an institution pre-eminently national in its aims,
and on