and I fear not seldom in absolute hostility to it—than to make them at long last learn something about their own land, at least sufficient to let them know that they had a history, a language, and a country. The demand that Irish should be an essential for entrance is made with the intention of Irishising the secondary schools of the country. Boys and girls, over eighty per cent, of whom are already taught the language in those institutions, will then be all taught it, and taught it much better and more carefully; and those superior people who either really despise or affect to despise the language and country of their ancestors will then have to fall into line with their humble or more patriotic brothers and sisters. Again, if Irish is made an essential for matriculation, it will ensure that Irish-minded people enter the University but it will not handicap anybody whatsoever inside the University itself, for it can, if the student wishes, be dropped by him the moment he begins to specialise.
There have, however, been objections raised by the opponents of essential Irish which are worthy of the deepest consideration. The first is that Protestants would be prevented from going to the University because Irish is not taught in the Protestant schools, or is taught in very few of them. In answer to this it is said that the new University was not established for Protestants, who can go to Trinity College or Belfast if they will, and it is not fair to frustrate the desire of the nation for the sake of a possible handful of Protestant students. My own opinion on this point is that if the University be made frankly Irish it will absorb every national Protestant in the country, and gain in the long-run perhaps ten times as many Protestant students (many of whom are very national) as if it pursued a contrary course.
A second objection is that there are many good Irishmen in England in the Civil Service and elsewhere, and that it would not be fair to demand a knowledge of Irish from their children. The answer is that there is a branch of the Gaelic League in every big city in England, where Irish can always be learnt, and that though there may be a residuum who
