ADELAIDE AND VICINITY 279 Mo T the St Reverend John O'Reily, D.D., Roman Catholic Archbishop of Adelaide HE Roman Catholic Church, from the early foundation of the several colonies of Australia, has been a most powerful religious denomination in these parts, and its success is to be ascriixxl to the ability and pious zeal of its clergy, as well as to iberal enthusiasm of its adherents. In the infantile stages of the history of a colony, when many difficulties and vicissi- tudes had to be sternly faced, and with little pecuniary reconi])ense, ministers of the Roman Catholic faith carried on their work with surprising vigor. The name of Archbishop O'Reily is inseparably connected with the growth of the Roman Catholic Church in Western and South Australia. Few ministers of his or any Church have devoted themselves so earnesth' and energetically to the advancement of Christian in- terests in the Australian colonies. John O'Reily (now Roman Catholic Archbishop of Adelaide) was born in November. 1846, in Kilkenny, Ireland. His elementary instruction was received in the Catholic parochial boys' school in .St. John's Parish of Kilkenny. In January, 1858, he entered St. Kieran's College, Kilkenny, where he laid the foundations of a comprehensive study in classics, science, and history. His powers of retention equalled his ap[)lication. Ideas, words, phrases, and whole quotations could be summoned up promptly in the memory when necessity demanded them. But it was not classics alone in which the future Archbi.shop revelled. Knowing and well perceiving the swift and rushing growth of scientific knowledge, O'Reily cultivated a close acquaintance with this ever-growing department of human knowledge. Exhaustive insight into the method of operations and results of science enabled him to balance more effectually the consequent inferences and hypotheses with the deductions and conclusions that centuries of close Scriptural study had presented to the spiritual world for guidance. After si, and a half years of incessant scholastic study at St. Kieran's College, the Hammer iSr^ Co., Photo
