ugirard, so
admirably conducted by Monseigneur d'Hulst, the Vicar-General of Paris.
Thanks to the law of July 12, 1875, and to the stand made by the friends
of liberty and religion when the law of March 18, 1880, was finally
enacted, the students of the Faculty of Law in these Catholic institutes
still have the right to present themselves with the certificates of
their several institutes at the public examinations for the diplomas of
the baccalaureate, the licentiate and the doctorate in law, and for the
certificate of capacity in the law, necessary to enable the successful
candidates to practise the legal profession in France. To maintain the
efficiency of the free Catholic institutions, the Catholics of France
have spared during the last few years neither labour nor money. More
than 17,000,000 francs have been contributed during that period to
establish the Catholic educational system in Paris alone, and more than
2,000,000 francs are yearly subscribed there to keep it up. As I have
already said, the University here at Lille represents an expenditure
during the same period of more than 11,000,000 francs and a still larger
prospective expenditure.

It would be interesting, if it were possible, to learn how much out of
their own pockets the propagandists of unbelief have expended during
this same decade upon the irreligious education of the children of their
countrymen! Were the truth attainable, the amount expended by them would
be found to bear to the amount received by them from their propaganda of
unbelief much less than the proportion of Falstaff's 'pennyworth of
bread' to his 'intolerable deal of sack!' While the Catholics of France
have been giving millions to defend the right of the French people to
protect the faith of their children, these men have been expending
hundreds of millions of the money of Catholic taxpayers upon school
buildings, the contracts for erecting which have been controlled by
themselves for their friends; they have been finding places in the
public educational service for their friends, dependants and allies, and
they have been comfortably drawing large salaries themselves from the
Treasury.

Set over against these incontrovertible facts, the fact, as
incontrovertible, for which I am indebted here to M. Grimbert, that of
the millions expended in defence of liberty and religion here at Lille,
a very large proportion has been contributed by one single Catholic
citizen of this ancient Flemi