Page:Catholic Encyclopedia, volume 17.djvu/590

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PAZ 574 PEAB8E

1870, elected bishop 1901, succeeding Bishop Riboldi, promoted, ai^pointed assistant at the pontifical throne

1920. The bishop has the right of palhum. TheCath- Goltraidhe" (Songs of Slumber and Sorrow). ^..vv^»

olic population of the diocese is 110,300. There are: in the language of his Connacht parish. He oe^an an

82 parishes, 198 secular priests, 10 regular priests, anthology of poetry in the Irish language, makmg his

65 seminarians, 20 Brothers, 59 Sisters, 112 churches own translations and putting much of his personality

and chapels. into them. In the spring of 1913 he made a visit to

America to raise funds for his schools by lecturing on Paz y Figueroa, Maria Antonia de San Josi£ de, Irish literature and his own ideas of education, preacher and missionary, b. at Santiago del Estero In the winter of 1913 the Irish Volunteers were m the Diocese of Salta, Argentina, in 1730; d. at formed. Pearse, Plunkett and MacDonagh became Buenos Aires on 6 March, 1799. At the age of members of a secret political society that had revolu- fifteen she dedicated herself to the service of Grod tion as its object and they strove to bring about for- and formed among her companions a society, without eign intervention. In 1914 the European War broke any special rule, for the practice of Christian virtue out and the threat of conscription, actual over-taxa- and the observance of the Evangelical counsels, tion, danger of famine and exasperation caused by She acted under the spiritual guidance of the Jesuits unfair and clumsy administration fanned the flames and when they were exiled she determined to carry of their purpose and the Volunteer movement spread, on their work and propagate their spirit as best she Pearse and his companions saw in the War their ereat could. With the approval of the religious authorities chance. On St. Patrick's Day, 1916, a vast body of and the cooperation of the Society of the Sisters of Volunteers paraded in College Green, Dublin, and Pious Sermons, she began to preach penance and urge saluted Eoin MacNeil, their recognized leader. The the laity to make the Spiritual Exercises, and between personality of Pearse and James Connolly, a Socialist, 1775 and 1779 evangeliised large districts, especially was responsible for the Easter uprising. Itoger Case- round Tucumdn, San Miguel, Rivin, ana C6rdoba. ment, landing in Kerry, failed to be met by those who She then visited Buenos Aires where she stirred up the were to take him to his destination and had been religious zeal of the clergy and laity, and in August, captured by police and taken to London, and at the 1780, with the archbishop's approval, she established same time a liner, the "Aud/' which accompanied a house of retreats, in which over 70,000 persons made Casement's submarine disguised as a Norwegian the Spiritual Exercises within the next eight years, timber ship, but carrying 20,000 rifles, millions of She then preached in Rio de la Plata and Monte- rounds of ammunition with machine guns and explo- video, where she remained three years. She was then sives had been stopped by a British patrol near recalled by the citizens of Buenos Aires, and on her Tralee where the arms were to be landed and the ship, return founded a Magdalen Asylum. She died in flying the German flag, was scuttled by her own the odor of sanctity in her sixty-ninth year, and on crew. A rising had been planned for Easter Sunday, 8 August, 1917, the cause of her canonization was but on leamine of this loss a countermanding order introauced at Rome. was sent broadcast on Holy Saturday. On Blaster

Acta Sanetae Sedia (1917). 435-38. Sunday the Volunteer council met to consider whether

or not a blow should be struck for they knew that the

Pearse, Padraic H., Irish educator, poet and British Government had learned from the sinking of

patriot, b. in Dublin in 1879, d. 3. May, 1916, the the '^Aud" how near insurrection had come to pass

son of an English sculptor, James Pearse, and an and that the decision was made to seize the Volunteer

Irish mother. He was educated in a private school in Executive and break, up the organization. MacNeill

Dublin, then was an intermediate student of the opposed unaided insurrection. Sean MacDiarmada,

Christian Brothers' school, at twelve he commenced Tom Clarke and Thomas MacDonagh were com-

the studv of the Irish language, and later studied mitted to the insurgent policy, Pearse is believed to

Canon O Leary's "Seadna" under supervision of the have favored the moderate counsel, but Connolly

author. When seventeen he founded the New Ireland declared that at any cost the Citizen Army should

Literary Society and his presidential addresses were strike before it disbanded and so Pearse, having

published in book form in 1898 as "Three Essays on preached at all times the duty of Irishmen to vindicate

Gaelic Topics." Before he was twenty-four Pearse their national faith, gave the vote for the insurrection

graduated from the Royal University and was ap- which turned the course of Irish history (see Ireland).

pointed Irish lecturer in Catholic University College, On Easter Monday (24 April, 1916), soon irfter

where he gained his B.A. and B.L. Padraic Pearse noon the Irish Republic was proclaimed in Dublin

became editor of the Gaelic League Official organ "An (the stirring proclamation was signed by Clarke,

Claidheamh Soluis" (The Sword of Light), and he MacDiarma^, Connolly, Eamonn Ceannt, Pearse,

announced his intention of making it the organ of MacDonagh and Plunkett) and the insuraent tri-color

militant Gaeldom. He was the first of the young waved from the flagstaff above the General Poet

men to be spoken of in the Gaelic League and he had Office in the heart of the Irish capital. There was little

mastered the language and learned about Gaelic life fighting on the first day. Britisn reinforcements were

by living for long spaces of time in a cottage he owned hurried into the country whUe all over Ireland a few

in West Connacht. And so he became a leader in the hundred youths, ill-armed, stood their ground against

movement to prepare the Irish for freedom, to turn the might of Britain. A circle of fire and sted was

their hopes toward an Ireland that would be a re- contracting around the daring insurgents and even the

surgent Gaelic nationality. He wrote continually in best organized counties had not enough munitions for

Irish and English and was an intelligent advocate of an hour's firing.

bi-lingual schools, founding one such for boys (St. Pearse was Commander in Chief and President of

Enda s) in 1908 and later, as the idea developed and the Provisional Government. The County Dublin

its success was assured, St. Ita'^s school for girls was Volunteers pierced into County Meath. taking the

also founded. In these schools he put into practice R. I. C. barracks and fighting a pitchea battle with

his ideas of national Irish education oased on religion the constabulary at Ashbume. In County Galway a

and patriotism and from henceforth his writings were large body of insurgents, led by Liam Mellows,

connected with this school. Thomas McDonagh advanced on Galway City. In County Wexford

became a member of the staff of St. Enda's and later Enniscorthy was seized on Thursday and the Repub-

Joseph Mary Plunkett became a pupil of his. Pearse lican flag hoisted on the Athenseum, and on Friday

wrote a Passion Play in Irish in 1911 and produced it encircling forces pressed close to the central scene of