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Cullen, Newman and the Irish Catholic University

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 October 2016

Extract

Roman Catholic historians have frequently cited lack of Government recognition and support as the main cause for the failure of the Catholic University. As evidence of this, they have pointed to its medical faculty, the relative success of which they attribute to the possibility at that time of being recognised as a medical practitioner without holding a university degree. Yet, by 1859, the year of his resignation as Rector, Newman had come to the conclusion that the real problems lay elsewhere. In the same year, the Irish Bishops admitted openly that the granting or withholding of state recognition would not ultimately determine the success or failure of the University. In any event, they could easily have overcome the difficulties posed by the lack of a charter by affiliating their College to London University, merely for the purpose of taking London examinations and degrees. This they admitted in a letter to the Home Secretary, Sir George Grey. In 1857, the Roman Catholic College of St John the Evangelist, Sydney, Australia, did affiliate, for the purpose of obtaining degrees, to one of the new non-denominational state-erected universities of that colony. But Newman was too suspicious of London's alleged liberalism and Cullen too jealous of undiluted episcopal control over the Dublin establishment to tolerate such a notion. It is, therefore, towards the attitudes and roles of these two that one is led in considering why the Catholic University failed.

Type
Articles
Copyright
Copyright © Catholic Record Society 1979

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References

Notes

1 McGrath, p. 485.

2 Pastoral Address of the Roman Catholic Archbishops and Bishops to the Catholic Clergy and People of Ireland, on the Catholic University, 1859.

3 Letter of the Archbishops and Bishops of Ireland to the Right Hon. Sir George Grey, Bart., M.P., Her Majesty's Secretary of State for home affairs, etc., on University Education, undated.

4 Daniel M. O'Connell to Cullen, 10 July 1857.

5 Moran, 1, p. 536.

6 Ten cardinals and two future popes attended Cullen's defence in Theology on 10 September 1838. MacSuibhne, 1, p. 145.

7 Ibid., p. 167.

8 John O'Donovan to J. W. Hanna, 5 May 1857, in An Leabharlann, 2, no. 2, Letter XV, March 1907.

9 Evidence given by Cullen before the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Public Education, in Moran, 2.

10 The Synodical Address of the Fathers of the National Council of Thurles, 1850.

11 The Catholic University Gazette (15 June 1854).

12 Newman to Ambrose St John, 22 November 1845.

13 Cited in MacSuibhne, 4, p. 284.

14 McClelland, Vincent A., English Roman Catholics and Higher Education, 1830–1903 (Oxford University Press, London, 1973), p. 112.Google Scholar

15 McGrath, p. 327.

16 Ibid., p. 405.

17 Newman to J. Wallis, 3 September 1856, in ibid., p. 399.

18 Newman to T. W. Allies, 6 July 1856, in ibid., p. 395.

19 Newman to Dr Grant, 7 March 1856, in ibid., p. 380.

20 Evidence given by Cullen before the Powis Commission, in Moran.

21 Cullen to Newman, 8 September 1855.

22 Cullen to Kirby, October 1855.

23 Cullen to Cardinal Barnabo, 31 August 1858.

24 Leahy to Cullen, 20 November 1855.

25 Cullen to Newman, 12 January 1855.

26 McGrath, p. 240.

27 Ibid., p. 241.

28 Ibid., p. 244.

29 Cullen to Barnabo, 21 February 1854.

30 Cullen to Barnabo, 28 July 1855.

31 Quinn to Cullen, 6 November 1858.

32 McGrath, p. 152.

33 The collection of copied Cullen letters to Newman in the possession of Fr Peadar MacSuibhne of Carlow College, Ireland, includes one such letter for 1850, thirteen for 1851, ten for 1852, one for 1853, nine for 1854, five for 1855, seven for 1856, six for 1857 and onefor 1858. This collection does not claim to be exhaustive.

34 Atkinson, p. 132.

35 Leahy to Cullen, 1 November 1850.

36 In 1862, for example, the Tuam Province donated only £420 of the £6,437 collected in the churches for the Catholic University. In the following year, Tuam donated a mere £351 out of £6,260 (figures obtained in the Roman Catholic Archdiocesan Archives of Dublin).

37 Cullen to Newman, 20 December 1854.

38 Woodlock to Cullen, 25 November 1862.

39 Report of the Committee of the Catholic University to the Bishops of Ireland, May 1854.

40 Address of the Catholic University Committee to the Clergy of Ireland, 12 November 1851.

41 Report of the Committee of the Catholic University to the Bishops of Ireland, May 1854.

42 Ibid.

43 McGrath, p. 332.

44 Ibid., p. 333.

45 Ibid., p. 332.

46 Newman, J. H., My Campaign in Ireland (King, Aberdeen, 1896), p. xlvii.Google Scholar

47 Newman to J. W. Allies, 6 July 1856, in McGrath, p. 395.

48 Newman to Mrs Bowden, 13 September 1856, in ibid., p. 398.

49 Newman to Dr Grant, 7 March 1856, ibid.

50 Woodlock to Cullen, 1860, undated.

51 Bishop O'Brien to Cullen, 30 April 1866.

52 Atkinson, p. 121.

53 Ibid., p. 133.

54 McGrath, pp. 251-2, 262-3.

55 Moriarty to Woodlock, 23 July 1868.

56 Cartlan to Cullen, undated report.

57 D. Power to Cullen, undated.

58 McGrath, p. 241.

59 Ibid.

60 Address of the Catholic University Committee, 8 July 1851.

61 Pastoral Address of the Archbishops and Bishops of Ireland on the Catholic University, undated.

62 Pope Hennessy, John, The Failure of the Queen's Colleges and of Mixed Education in Ireland (Bryce, London, 1859).Google Scholar

63 McGrath, pp. 262-3.

64 Leahy to Cullen, 10 November 1850.