DEAR SIR,

LETTER XVIII.

Cork, July 28, 1807.

IT

T would require a volume to dwell upon the different modes in which the catholic clergy of Ireland exert themselves to procure, not only a moral and religious, but also a practically useful.education, for the poor children of their respective parishes. This is the fact with respect to the villages and hamlets no less than the towns and cities. I can speak to this point from my own observation and experience for when, in travelling through the country, my chaise has stopped at a village, have generally made it my business to enquire for the school, which I have often found to be the same building with the chapel, and I have always found it well filled with children, who were learning to read, write, and cast accounts, besides their catechism. In like manner, when the driver of the chaise, in creeping up a mountain or hill, has descended from his seat in order to

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relieve his horses, I have seldom failed to descend from mine, in order to intrude myself into some or other of the smoky cabins of the poor on the road side, for the purpose of examining the children, who swarm in them, upon the chief points of their catechism. Now I aver that, upon the desert mountains as well as in the thronged villages, I have found the children in general far better instructed in their religious and moral duties, than I have found poor children of the same age (for I have heretofore made it my business to examine them also) in the country places of England *. This assertion, which intimates that the lower order of Irish are, upon the whole, more instructed than the same class in England, I know, will surprise you. But to convince you that I am not singular in my ideast, and by way of taking a more comprehensive view of the subject, I shall state to you a fact which I

The present Bishop of London complains, that he "found vast numbers of his diocesans in a state little short of pagan ignorance and irreligion." What wonder that a great proportion of the members of the established church should be as indifferent to its doctrine as to its rites, when we are assured from good authority, that out of a population of 64,coo inhabitauts, '52,000" are of the låtter description. Archdeacon Woodhouse's Charge, A. D. 1800.

The intelligent author of a late pamphlet, called "The Address of a Christian Philosopher to the Hibernian Society in London for the Diffusion of Religious Knowledge in Ireland," 'very forcibly maintains and proves, that the bulk of the vulgar Irish are better instructed in the Christian doctrine than the bulk of the vulgar English, P: 5

have lately learned from a military officer of equal honour and discernment. He said that, having raised a company of soldiers, composed of nearly the same number of Englishmen and Irishmen, he found so many more of the latter had learned to read and write than of the former, that he was obliged to choose most of his serjeants from amongst them. As you are seldom without a regiment or a battalion at least of regulars in your neighbourhood, in which, of course, you will find a third of the soldiers Irish, I invite you to make the experiment upon it with respect to the comparative number of Englishmen and Irishmen who have learnt to read and write, which my friend was obliged to make upon his company; and I request you will communicate to me the result of your enquiry.

If what is stated should be well-grounded, how much is the English public imposed upon by the incessant and loud complaints with which it is stunned on the subject of the alledged brutal ignorance of the Irish poor, and their total want of education, as if they were a race of savages, unacquainted with the use of letters, and utterly destitute of christian and moral instruction ! If this were true, the fault would not rest with them, but with their government, which, till of late years, prohibited their having masters of their own religion. But it is not true; for as to the use of letters, I really believe, conformably to.

the statement of my friend the officer, that a greater comparative number of them are acquainted with it, than of the poor cottagers in ` our own country; and with respect to christian and moral information, I know and am sure that the former are learned compared with the latter. If, Sir, you hesitate to admit this assertion, I request you will, in the first place, after reading over the Church Catechism in The Common Prayer Book, and The General Catechism for the Catholics of Ireland*, impartially tell me, without any reference to controverted points, which of the two compositions you think best calculated to furnish a comprehensive idea of the doctrines of Christianity, and the general duties of morality. In the second place, I beg you will inform yourself of any man, whatever his description may be, who has visited both islands, whether the Catholic Clergy on my side of the water, or the Protestant Clergy on your side of it, are most assiduous in visiting and instructing their poor parishioners, and particularly in teaching the children their Catechism†.

* Printed and sold by Fitzpatrick, No. 4, Capel-street, Dublin. The author of the above quoted Address to the Hibernian Society, paints a striking, but true picture of the professional labours and merits of the Catholic Clergy of Ireland in the following passage: “If, "Gentlemen, you are not under the influence of very gross prejudice, “you will, in receiving representations of the necessitous state of "Ireland, maturely weigh the allegations of men who have stigma

Yet, such is the infection of a general report, that those who are liberal on other subjects are found to be bigotted on this. Thus the late tourist writes as follows: "The instruction of "the common people (in Ireland) is in the lowest state of degradation. In the summer a "wretched uncharactered itinerant derives a scanty existence by opening a school in some "ditch covered with heath and furze.' What

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proportion of morals and learning can flow

“tized, and still stigmatize as the last of mankind, some of the most "deserving and useful men in the community. Yes, Gentlemen, "take an impartial view of them, and you must allow that I do not say too much. There are among them preachers and teachers of "the first excellence: there are men of profound erudition, men of "nice classical taste, and men of the best critical acumen. They are not formed, it is true, to shine in the drawing-room or at the tea"table; nor are such qualifications very desirable in churchmen; for 66 you well know, that the refined manners of fashionable life are often as incompatible with christian morality, as the grosser vices of "the vulgar herd. Their manners are, in general, decent; but their "exertions are great, their zeal is indefatigable. See them, in the "most inclement seasons, at the most unseasonable hours, in the most uncultivated parts, amidst the poorest and most wretched " of mankind! They are always ready at a call; nothing can deter "them; the sense of duty surmounts every obstacle! And there is 66 no reward for them in this world! The good effects of their zeal are visible to every impartial and discerning mind; notwithstanding the many great disadvantages under which it labours. For instance, you may often find a parish so extensive and populous as to "require two or three clergymen properly to serve it; and yet the poverty of the parish is such as to be scarce able to maintain one in a tolerably decent manner. I could point out many other disad"vantages, but I forbear at present, &c.--After all, the good "effects are so conspicuous, that I repeat it again: the lower orders "of Irishmen are better instructed in the doctrines of Christianity, "than the lower orders of Englishmen." P. 27.

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