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to partake of the unity of the one principle on which they are exercised. She is, on the one hand, the most uncompromising upholder of constituted authority against revolutionary violence; and, on the other, the most persistent defender of popular liberty against aggressive despotism.

When the Church met that pagan society of old, she found a "modern thought" that was bitterly hostile to her pretensions. She found all temporal power arrayed against her in the prosecution of her appointed work. The individual convert found that, as a member of civil society, he was beset on all sides by the gravest difficulties. These difficulties may be summed up in the fact, that by remaining a Christian he exposed himself to imminent peril of his very life. Did the Church, in the face of this peril-which she would be the last to underrate-did she abate one tittle of her high demand? Not so. She said to the convert :-"If it be so, let it be so. If peril be to limb or life, it is simply your duty to face it. Martyrdom is a high calling, and needs a special grace; but if martyrdom comes in your one path to Heaven, then you must be a martyr, not as doing something so heroic that you might shrink from it, but as doing your simple duty even at the cost of life-as in quieter times you would be called upon to do it at no greater cost than resisting an ordinary temptation."

And as the Church was then, so is she now; and as was then the great pagan world, so in our day, too, is the great world, even that section of it that calls itself Christian, but denies the Divine authority of the Church of God. They do not now these worldlings-ask a Catholic to burn incense in a temple of Jupiter; but they do ask him to offer incense to a more satanic deity. They have made for themselves a great god, have breathed into it the foul breath of their own nostrils, and have set it up in Christian lands, and called it-Public Opinion, or "modern thought"-that is, a public opinion and a modern thought fashioned on the principles of all men of all countries whose first principle is to hate the Church and to resent her claims. The worship goes on in many a templethe priests are arrayed, now in the livery of material wealth, now in the garb of science, now in the vestments of philosophy. The liturgy is furnished by a teeming press whose great principle is the necessity of unbounded license for itself; its gospel is redacted in the treatises of political economy which proclaim, in explicit and shameless words, that the end of man and of society is to accumulate wealth. They ask a Catholic to bow down before this idol and acknowledge its god-head-to bring the Church that baptized him to be judged before its tribunal -to join in proclamation of that unbounded "liberty of con

science" that more than one Pope has branded as "an insanity"-and to uphold that unlimited "liberty of the press" that makes it a propaganda of corruption. They ask him to truckle to religious indifference, and to stain his conscience and belie his intelligence by talking the nonsensical jargon of "universal toleration."

In those days, and in these countries, Catholics are surrounded by an atmosphere that holds, as it were in solution, the most deadly poisons; and they can hardly exaggerate the evil influence that an un-Catholic and an anti-Catholic press can gradually exercise on Catholic instincts. In such circumstances it is necessary to aim at being (if we may be allowed the exaggeration) more Catholic than the Church herself. It is needful that Catholic principles-especially those of them that are distinctively and aggressively Catholic-should be not merely apprehended by the intellect, but brought home in full force to the whole moral and intellectual nature, and made the motive powers of social and political action. We should have them on our lips and in our hearts, and bound on the determined foreheads which we raise to confront the infidel politics which strive, and not without a certain melancholy success, to rule this Europe that once was Christian and Catholic; and that may, in God's good time, if we, and such as we, do well our part, be Christian and Catholic again. It is needful that our watchwords be-No compromise of Catholic truth, but a full insistance on it down to its last detail, cost what it may; no paltering with conscience for temporal ends, however desirable; no seeking even for glorious issues by unholy means; no scant and grudging, but a full and heartfelt submission to that voice that goes out across the waste of waters, wherein powers and thrones have been engulphed, from the bark of Peter. There is no man, however humble, but can exert some influence on the society around him; and there is not-at any rate, there ought not to be--any Catholic indifferent to the duty of fostering and spreading sound Catholic principles. Turn which way we will, we find our most cherished convictions attacked either by open hostility or covert insinuation, and we should be prepared to detect sophistry and refute error. To do so effectually, we have but to look back upon "the line of light" that marks the path along which the Church has travelled through the centuries; and be guided by the voice of that infallible truth that has met old errors, and vanquished them and buried them in graves of ages past; and that is prompt to-day, as ever, to confront them when they rise, as old errors do rise, in new forms, disinterred by evil hands from the unholy graves that were sealed, in times gone by, with the dread anathema of the Church of God.

544

IRISH COLLEGES SINCE THE REFORMATION.

MADRID.

WE E know very little of this house. As it never was incorporated with Salamanca like the other Spanish Colleges, the documents referring to it are not within our reach, but we will try to give to the readers of the IRISH ECCLESIASTICAL RECORD the little we have been able to glean about it.

It was founded in the year 1629, some say by the venerable Thobada Copleton, restorer of the College in Seville; but I conceive there must be some mistake in this, as I am convinced from what was said of the latter College, that Copleton went to Ireland long before this date. Don Dermisio O'Brien, chaplain to Philip IV., was its second rector, and he gave to the young establishment his own house in the Calle del Humilladero, where this pious foundation still exists. For the space of twenty years after its foundation it supported from ten to twenty students with the revenues allotted it by the corporation of the city and others. These resources failing, the Cardinal Archbishop of Toledo, Don Baltasar Moscoso Sandoval, turned it, in 1692, into a house of refuge for the Irish students coming to Madrid to seek the customary viaticum which the king of Spain was accustomed to give them on their return to Ireland: this viaticum amounted to £10. The patronage was vested in the Committee of Beneficed Priests till about 1759, when it passed to the Archbishop.

Some houses were purchased in 1669, and in 1690 a church and sacristy were made of them. This work was accomplished by means of alms, and the gratuitous labour of various persons in the neighbourhood on Sundays and festival days.

By royal order of 5th June, 1768, Charles III. took this establishment under his royal patronage, and appointed Don Andres Gonzalez de Barcia, Mayor of Madrid, its Judge Protector. On his death Don Gaspar Melchor succeeded him; and in 1792 all the affairs of this patronage was handed over to the Count de Isla.

On the 7th November, 1792, the Count appointed Don Pedro Perlines interim administrator, with a salary of £35 per annum; and on the death of the rector, Don Guillermo Navin, this office was also conferred on him.

It is known also that the Count framed new constitutions, which, however, it appears were never confirmed.

The Count of Isla died in 1807, and it is not known whether a new Judge Protector was appointed.

The Rector-Administrator, Perlines, left Madrid in 1819, to recruit his health, and authorized Don Simon Martinez Rubio to receive the rents and discharge the debts of the house. The net value of these rents has not been accurately ascertained, and they apparently consist of the rents of houses burthened with various charges, and of the interest accruing from the capital accumulated from property sold.

The result of these different changes within the last century has been to gradually obscure the primitive intention of this establishment, and turn its rents into channels never contemplated by its pious founders. At present, and for many years past, the Irish nation, for whose benefit it was intended, derives no advantage whatever from it. The Corporation of Madrid has pulled down two of the houses and erected new ones in their place, which renders any attempt to recover the property very difficult. Doctor Garltan laboured for years in the hope of succeeding, and employed all the influential interest he had in Madrid, but to no purpose. The present rector of Salamanca is again engaged in the same attempt, and has hopes of finally succeeding if the unfortunate times through which we are now passing, and which paralyze all action, would pass and open up an era of a more peaceful and propitious character.

ALCALA DE HENARES.

This College was founded in 1657 by Baron George de Paz y Silveira, who gave it the interest of £5,768, sunk in juros as rent. Juros are perpetual annuities imposed on lands or houses and paid in kind. It was incorporated with the famous University founded by the great Cardinal Ziminez, in which his grand Complutensian Polyglot was compiled and printed. This Irish College was never of any great importance. It was founded specially and exclusively for students from the north of Ireland. It was the constant scene of disorders from the beginning, and this could not well be otherwise, as the founder ordained that the students should elect their own rector every four years, the outgoing one to be ineligible: the rector should necessarily be one of the present students. Sometimes this rule was not strictly observed by the outgoing rector, and there is one instance on record where he contrived to have himself reelected to the great indignation of some of his companions, who protested against the illegality of the election, but in vain. They wrote to Madrid complaining of this serious breach of their democratic constitution, but obtained no redress. They then determined on going in person to complain to the Camara; but the rector, foreseeing their determination, sent a message

round to all the coach owners, and the hirers out of horses and asses, that he would not be responsible if they entrusted their property to any student, and they should do so at their risk; he also refused travelling charges to the students. When they tried to get a horse or a vehicle they were met with an unqualified refusal; but so determined were they on asserting their rights that they went on foot. They got very little satisfaction in Madrid, and had to return and bear their grievances as best they could.

Even so early as 1729 the bishops of Ireland were anxious to cut at the root of these disorders by having the College incorporated with the Jesuit establishment, and a Jesuit rector at its head; but they were met with a thousand objections to the system of the Society, which it was said would not suit the Alcala house at all. The fact is, that it continued to the end as it was. Charles III., in his letter confirming the appointment of Dr. Birmingham as visitor in 1778, commanded that no more students should be received in it, and that it should be incorporated with Salamanca when cleared of its existing inmates. This incorporation was finally effected in 1785, when its last rector was Rev. Patrick Magennis. Father Magennis appears to have been of a different stamp from his predecessors, for he held office for several years, and was a zealous president and a good administrator; but the rebellious training he had received showed itself in his opposition to Dr. Curtis, the then rector of Salamanca, when he went, in 1785, to take possession. Father Magennis, and a student named M'Mahon, who had been received in spite of the order of Charles III. to the contrary, some year or two before barricaded the door, and refused to pay any attention to the bell when Dr. Curtis rang. The mayor of the town had to come with a posse of police and a notary to witness the proceedings, and after formally demanding unconditional surrender from the two valiant defenders of the fortress against all the power of the great king of all the Spains, had to break open the door and take the College by storm. This was the last of the restless and disturbed Irish house in Alcala de Henares. It was called the College of St. George.

The juros of the founder were extinguished by Ferdinand VI., and a pension of £284 per annum substituted. This pension has been paid to the College of Salamanca since the incorporation, except during the years of the War of Independence, up to 1st July, 1871, when it was eliminated from the Budget without examination or reason assigned, and although it had been declared by a Committee of the Cortes, which examined it thoroughly in 1822, to be a claim of rigorous

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