BOOKS.
NEWMAN ON UN I*ERSITIES.* Tars volume is a republication of a series of papers which appear- ed in the Catholic University Gazette, and it retains the slight and sketchy character which marks the treatment of a large and learned subject in a series of- newspaper or magazine articles. A lucid, graceful, and winning style, sets off to advantage a rapid statement of the leading features of ancient and mediaeval uni- versities; while the -Protestant reader will be every now and then startlea and amused by the novel light which Dr. Newman throws from a private lantern of his own upon certain historical matters which we are used to look at from a totally different point of view. Thus he will find, that the Roman Catholics in Great Britain are, in our times subject to a persecution they have never before ex- perienced. "It may strike one with surprise," are his words, "that in the middle of the nineteenth century, in an age of pro- fesSed light and liberality, so determined a spirit of persecution should have arisen, as we experience it, in these countries, against thoProfessors of the ancient faith." But the surprise is only mo- mentary.; for, " after all, - far from suggesting matter for alarm and despondency, it is nothing more or less than a confession on the part of our :adversaries, how strong we are, and how great our promise." And again—" -It is the expression of their profound misgiving that. the religion which existed yaw before theirs is destined to Jive long after it." Perse- cution we presume, indicates panic in the Protestant Church, but sublime faith in the subjects of the Pope; Dr. New- man cannot intend to insinuate that the Papal Church has all along doubted the strength of Peter's rock, and continues to doubt it ; unless, indeed, as is highly probable from his common method-of dealing with historical facts he would deny that the Papal Church had ever used the instrument of persecution, and *at it uses it any longer, and would not hesitate to allege Spain, Tuscany; Naples, Rome itself, and the Inquisition, as proofs irrefragable of his assertion. In this very volume, he not only makes the startling statement we have quoted, amounting to the assertion that the Roman Catholics of Great Britain are perse- cuted more than they ever were at previous times, but tells us that the success of the Papacy has been uniformly owing to the ",detachment" of the Popes from secular interests and. secular policy. " The Apostles were told to be prudent as serpents and simple as doves.- It has been the simplicity of the Sovereign Pon- tiff's which has been their prudence. It is . . . . their detach- ment from all secular objects which has given them the possession of the 'earth." A little further on, we are called to admire " what an eye the Sovereign Pontiffs have for the future ; and what an independerice in policy and vigour in action, have been the cha- racteristics of their present 'representative." Might not the last two, sentences have present written by Voltaire, after sharpening
the end of his pen and squeeiing an additional drop of gall into his ink?
The, staple of the volume, is not, however, of so original or amusing a character. On the contrary, the matter is old, and familiar to all that numerous class of persons who have closely followed the discussions of the last few years on the English and Scotch Universities. What belongs to Dr. Newman is his agree- able style, and the practical application of -his facts to the insti- tution which somewhat audaciously usurps the title of The Ca- tholic University. As this institution has no charter of incor- poration, Dr. Newman knows as well as we do that it has no claim to the tille.of University within the British dominions, the word nrumisrrAs being solely and simply the Latin for incor- poration. If he wants to distinguish his adult school in posse from. The Qtieen's University in Ireland, to which it was directly and avowedly intended to be opposed, why does he not call it The Pope's University? since it is entirely under the management of the.Papal Legate, and has failed, we are told by an Irish priest in the .TaUel, just for this reason, the Irish prelates as a. body not being disposed to put their necks under the feet of this official, nor their people to put their purses at his disposal. The-whole scheme is another instance of the insolence of the Ultramontane party in daring to usurp within the dominions of the Queen of Great Britain titles which she alone has the right to be- stow ; and if the country were really as afraid of the Ro- mardsts as Dr. Newman, by reading history with one eye, has persuaded himself, that insolence would,be visited with some severer penalty than contempt. Leaving aside; however, all ques- tions of name,—as, happily under the circumstances of our public ?Pinion, at once harmless and absurd,—what is the object of Dr. piewman's appeal? and what the nature of the institution he wishes to recommend to his readers ? The object is simply to place all the • The °Zee and Work of Universities. By John Henry Newman, D.D., of the 'ratorM. Published by Longman and [MONTHLY SUPPLEMENT.]
higher education of the Catholics of Great Britain and her Colo- nies under Papal regulations, and to erect an institution that shall attract them from all parts of that mighty empire upon which the sun never sets, to pass the period of academic study under the personal influence of devoted servants of the Papacy, and in the pursuit of truth as modified by the edicts of Popes, the decrees of Councils, and the traditions of that church to which, and not to the writings of the Apostles, we owe, as we are in- formed by Dr. Newman, 'the more sacred doctrines of revela- tion." " The more sacred doctrines of revelation were not com- mitted to books, but passed on by successive tradition. The doc- trines of the Blessed Trinity and the Eucharist appear to have been so handed down for some hundred years ; and when at length reduced to writing," are expressions which will we should think, give a painful surprise to many devout Catholics, no less than to all Protestants.
It may be confessed that a grander conception has seldom pre- sented itself to the mind of an enthusiast. And it is not sur- prising that a man so much under the influence of one set of ideas as Dr. Newman is should see in history more encouragement to- wards its realization than we can see. He points to the fact that universities in ancient times and in the middle ages rose not by state patronage, but by individual influence; not by the attrac- tion of rich endowments for successful students, nor of privileges bestowed upon all who could pass certain examinations, but by the zeal of learners eager for knowledge, and the genius of pro- fessors eager and able to communicate it. He dwells upon the advantages, so eloquently stated by the Oxford Professor of Mo- dern History, of the oral lecture over the book, of the collision of mind with mind, of the influence of character upon education. He finds in the rapid spread of the English language, coincidently with the vast emigration of the Catholic Irish who speak that lan- guage, reason to expect a mighty concourse of Catholic students eager to learn as soon as Catholic professors are ready to teach. He shows how in the old world and in the middle ages the love of learning brought students to undergo toils and privations in their eagerness to seek out the ablest teachers, to which even the jour- ney from Australia to Ireland can in our days bear no comparison. Above all, there is a revival of Catholic zeal all over the world, and the Sovereign Pontiff has originated and blessed the under- taking. " We are going forward," he tells us, " in the strength of the Cross, under the patronage of Mary, in the name of Pa- trick." In a passage from which'we have already quoted a sen- tence, Dr. Newman sums up the circumstances that promise suc- cess to the undertaking; reserving for his master-stroke the fact that the blessing of Pius IX' is on the work. •
"These are the facts of the day, which we should bee before our eyes, Whether the Pope had anything. to say to them or no. The English language
and the Irish race are overrunning the world. '
" When; then, I consider what an eye the Sovereign Pontiffs have for the future ; and what an independence in •policy and vigour in action have been the characteristics of their present representative • and what a flood of suc- cess, mounting higher and higher, has lifted up the ark of God from the beginning of this century and then, that the Holy Father has definitely put his finger upon Ireland, and selected her soil as the seat of a great Catholic University, to spread religion, science, and learning, wherever the English language is spoken ; when I take all these things toget r—I care not what others think, I care not what others do, God has no need of men—oppose who will, shrink who will, I know and cannot doubt that a great work is begun. It is no great imprudence to commit onesself to a guidance which never yet has failed ; nor is it surely irrational or fanatical to believe, that whatever difficulties or disappointments, reverses or delays may be our lot in the prosecution of the work, its ultimate success is certain, even though it seem at first to fail,—.just as the greatest measures in former times have been the longest in carrying out ; as Athanasius triumphed though he passed away before Arianism, and Hildebrand died in exile that his successors might enter into his labours."
We hardly know, amid this press of distinguished patronage,
in to which influence Dr. Newman attributes his best chances of suc- cess. He puts " the strength of the Cross" first, but Pius IX seems his favourite power ; unless, indeed, the explanation be, that Dr. Newman, becoming all things to all men, iss-learning the true Irish dialect, and, as in Ireland the Lord-Lieutenant is thought more of than the Sovereign he represents, so in the Irish religion Christ's vicegerent is a more important personage than his principal. St. Patrick at any rate was, as we know on the infallible authority of tradition, " a gentleman, and came of de- cent people " ; so we may hope that the new Catholic University will breed up a more polished and cleanly race than the old Catholic seminary of Maynooth has succeeded in turning out.
What then are the chances that Dr. Newman's dream will be realized, and that henceforth there will be a counter-emigration from the Colonies to Ireland, not driven back as heretofore by want and disappointment, but attracted by the religious sanctity and intellectual splendour of the new Alma Mater on the Liffey? what hope that the Bologna, the Padua, the Paris, and the Ox- ford of the middle ages, will spring to life again on the shores of the beautiful bay of Dublin ? Alas for the gulph that severs
conception and accomplishment—for the easy luxury of splendid dreams, the blank disappointment of sober waking ! How many conditions of the problem he has been constructing has Dr. New- man forgotten! First and foremost, where are the profound and brilliant professors, the men who combine deep learning and ar- dent piety with the genius and character that are to attract scho- lars from all quarters of the globe, and win them from all com- petitors by mere force of mental and moral power ? The staff of the new University is given at the close of Dr. Newman's volume. With the exception of Dr. Newman himself, trained as we all know at Oxford, there is not a name known out of Ireland. Yet the staff is numerous—more numerous, we are told, than the pupils they have to teach. Where, we may go on to ask, could there be found among British Catholics a staff of professors that would not seem a prac- tical satire upon the glowing descriptions of great teachers with which Dr. Newman's pages are adorned ? There are among them men of ability and men of learning, such as abound at Oxford and Cambridge ; but at both those seats of education, with all the tempta- tions they hold out, it is not found possible to secure such teachers as Dr. Newman's scheme presupposes, for the chairs. Here and there a man of genius devotes himself to academic studies, and has a chance of getting a professorship ; but the average of professors are, always have been, and, we fear, always will be, men of ability indeed, ' eed, but not the sort of men to attract scholars, as the great teachers of antiquity and of the middle ages appear to have at- tracted them, by thousands. Perhaps Dr. Newman expects St. Patrick in person to come and lecture : he believes in many events not less surprising ; and the crisis would, in his opinion, be just the one to call forth the miraculous powers of the Church, which are never suspended. Here, too, would be a miracle that even hard-hearted Protestants could scarcely fail to believe, and could not rank in the same class of juggleries with winking Virgins and liquefying blood. Pius IX of course can decree a miraele, or at least has influence enough with the power he represents to ob- tain one ; let him create a staff of professors for Dr. Newman that will attract students to Ireland from Australia, as Australian gold attracts diggers from Europe, (to borrow Dr. Newman's own simile,) and we shall be tempted to believe in the " Holy Father " ourselves. Certainly, Oxford and Cambridge would undergo a severer test of their attachment to Protestantism in this case than they have ever yet been submitted to. We verily believe they would by letters under their corporate seals at once petition the Pope for a share of the boon, even though the price were to curse the glorious, pious, and immortal memory of Dutch William, and to make his Holiness Chancellor ex officio in perpetuity.
But, granting that the Fathers, the Doctors, and the Saints,
could burst their cerements, collect toes, thumbs, and vest- ments, from all the shrines of Christendom,—in which case some of them would realize the old fable of Mamas, as they already realize the favourite Irish figure of being in two places at once,— even with this staff we question whether Dr. Newman would find his grand vision of a cosmopolitan university converted into a waking reality. Whatever he and other able men may say about the superiority of oral teaching, and however they may cite in- stances from old times of students flocking by thousands to attend the lectures of famous teachers, those instances all took place be- fore bookk were plentiful and cheap ; and, except in the experi- mental sciences, oral teaching fails as a rule to attract really earnest students, wherever we see the two methods in competi- tion, and wherever the student's progress is tested by strict examinations. Where examinations are not in use, or where they are conducted loosely, or are in the hands of the pro- fessor who lectures, no doubt oral teaching is sufficiently at- tractive to draw Atentive audiences ; but let the students know that their attainments will be strictly tested by inde- pendent examiners, and we venture to say that their reliance will be placed on books and not on lectures. In fact, we believe that whatever additional stimulus to study is afforded by attend- ance on first-rate lectures, whatever charm they possess as an in- tellectual excitement, all real attainment in knowledge comes in our day from the careful study of books. And we do not imagine that the most brilliant staff of professors that Dr. Newman can even conceive would, in the present abundant supply of good books, draw twenty youths per annum from all parts of the Bri- tish Colonies, who would not come to an English University as it is.
And this leads us to remark, that Dr. Newman seems to forget why young men are sent to universities in the present day. He assumes throughout that the love of knowledge, and the opportu- nities of attaining it in universities, are what draw students. Now it may safely be asserted, that of a hundred young men not ten go to the Universities either here or on the Continent simply to get knowledge. Those who go to study seek universities be- cause there are to be obtained certificates and rewards of profi- ciency, which are of tangible exchange-value in the business of life ; because through these open the avenues to the church, to the learned professions, to public life, to good society ; those who do not go to study go because it is the fashion to go, and because their fathers went, for a hundred. obvious reasons quite uncon- nected with the love of knowledge. Now Dr. Newman's Catholic University can grant no degrees, has no emoluments to give, no fashion to set its stamp on membership, nothing in the best con- ceivable case but knowledge. It may appear paradoxical to say that studious men do not go to Universities for the sake of know- ledge • but when we consider how little studious men owe to the direct teaching of others—how well they are able to do without it —we shall see that the desire of such direct teaching must be a very small motive with them to undergo the expense and disci. pline and routine of an University course. So that if Dr. Newman could even offer a better set of teachers than any of the Univer- sities in England or on the Continent, it by no means follows that he would get the crowds of students he anticipates. We might also suggest, that it is very questionable whether even the Romanists who are British subjects are anxious to bring up their sons in strict Ultramontanism, and in perfect isolation from their Protestant fellow subjects. The Catholics of Ireland seem, we are happy to say, disposed. to take advantage of the Queen's Colleges, while Dr. Newman's scheme is hitherto a pron. tical failure. Henceforward, too, Cambridge and Oxford are open to persons of all creeds or of none, so far as degrees are concerned. We shall not probably have to wait many years before the emolu- ments of those Universities are also thown open to all persons without distinction of creed. London, too, has a University which offers advantages of education without distinction of creed, such as a provincial town will find it difficult to compete with. The colonists who make fortunes and send their children home for education are likely to be clear-sighted men of the world, and will not overlook the advantages which such old-established insti- tutions as Cambridge and Oxford possess over a new and private adult school. They may prefer London for their sons on many ac. counts, but are little likely to send them to Dublin unless they are bigoted Catholics. What the prospects of Romanism are in a thriving, hard-headed, rough-handed British colony, we do not pre- tend to augur. We have heard that the Irish emigrants have a ten- dency to lapse from the faith in America. But even at home we see the Romanists quite willing to trust their sons to the Govern- ment Universities, and apparently not willing to trust them to Dr. Newman's new University. These are plain facts. If the blessing of Pius IX can alter them so far even as to cause the British Catholics to open their purses for Dr. Newman's grand scheme, say to the amount that the Wesleyan Methodists raise annually for their missionary societies, (about 100,0001. per annum, we believe,) we shall )egin to credit the revival of Romanism as something more than one of the myriad phases of the death- struggle of political despotism.
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