uccess in uniting several Colleges into a
common University is sameness of type in the education given, and sameness
of discipline in the various Colleges. This condition is attained in France
by the centralizing and irresistible power of the State; in Oxford and in
Cambridge it has grown up spontaneously, and has partially succeeded; in
Oxford, however, as in Cambridge, the multiplicity of Colleges and of
rival, though similar interests, has produced feebleness in the government
of the central authority, which is a fault little complained of in the
University of France.

I shall presently inquire whether the Colleges of Ireland present that
similarity of type which is essential to the success of the experiment of
fusing them all into a common University; but in the meantime, admitting,
for the sake of argument, that the experiment would succeed, it is worth
while to ask whether it would be an advantage to the country.

In France we see the perfection of centralization and identity in the
Lyceums and Colleges of the entire country; in Germany, on the contrary, we
witness the full development of the ancient collegiate idea of the
University; twenty-seven distinct and independent University centres of
education exist among forty millions of Germans, each University differing
from the other, and each possessing its peculiar type of excellence, to
attract its Students. I believe that all who are acquainted with the
present condition of science and letters in the two countries will be
disposed to agree in thinking that the intellect of France is cramped by
the imperial cradle in which it is reared, while the genius of Germany is
fostered by the freedom of thought, stimulated by such excellent, though
diverse centres of development, as Vienna, Munich, Heidelberg, Bonn, or
Berlin.

University education in France pleases the doctrinaire, just as parterres
of flowers of similar hue please the eyes of the gardener; while the
Universities of Germany delight the thinker, as the graceful forms and
varied colours of the flowers of some tropical forest please the traveller,
whose instinctive taste prefers the charms and grace of nature to the
symmetry and rules of art.

The experiment of the union of different Colleges in a common University
has succeeded in France, in Oxford, and in Cambridge, in consequence of the
similarity of the Colleges united together; but such an experiment
attempted in Ireland would fail, as certainly as a